deercountry | To the Bottom of the Bottle

( There's some awful kind of irony to the fact Booker's been on Peter's mind a lot, lately. His interactions with the man were always mysterious, a little hard to figure out. But one thing has slowly peeked through his hazy snippets of memory: and that's that Booker helped him.

He has no idea he's nearing where the man lives. Lived. Maybe it's all just some coincidence, but Peter ends up walking that way, hands shoved into the front pockets of his hoodie. Despite his stature — tall, standing at six feet even — Peter moves like a ghost, almost too quiet. He's a gloomy presence, eyes rimmed in bruise-like dark circles, like he hasn't gotten good sleep in maybe his whole life.

That's when there's the loud shatter of glass from just up ahead, and the young man startles, wide-eyed. He finds the woman sitting alone on the porch, clearly upset by the looks of her — and hesitates. His instinct is always to run away from something unknown. But... )

Uh— hello? ( Peter finds himself calling, voice soft and shy and nervous. ) Are you okay?

( It's a dumb question, in retrospect, but he can't just leave someone like this. )

[ Booker was like that with people who didn't know him well. Dark, mysterious, brooding. An enigma that masked, at his core, someone warm and kind.

She's too caught up in it. In thoughts of him, in the memories they've built together not just here but back in the old place, too. Her breath comes in short, stuttered sobs, movement out of the corner of her high sending tension rippling through her body.

She straightens, sucking in a breath and wiping hurriedly at her cheeks. ]

M'fine. [ Her voice is tight, clipped. Her eyes not quite meeting his gaze, arms folding across her chest. ]

( Peter's certainly no stranger to not being fine. He's also no stranger to wanting to be left alone when he's not fine. So he continues to be met with this strange, paradoxical need to both leave the young woman alone and the thought that he shouldn't do that, because seeing someone so clearly miserable and turning away from them feels wrong.

He hesitates again, eyes sweeping over to the shattered bottle of alcohol, then back to her teary face. Empathy curls into his gut so hard it feels like a wound of his own, tight and raw. )

....Do you want a joint? I have extra.

( The offer is voiced awkwardly, but no less gently. Is it weird to be offered a joint by a random stranger who just came walking up on the streets? Absolutely, but this place has made things like that a necessity, okay. )

They uh, really help me when I feel like shit.

[ Not being fine is kind of Sara's status quo. It was Booker's, too, but together... with him, it seemed okay.

It twists something in her chest, and she wipes at her cheeks again, struggling to steel herself as he gets closer. She's about to decline, wave him away, insist that she's fine and she just needs to be alone.

But God, she could use a smoke. She swallows, considering him a moment before nodding. ]

( Peter lingers there in his awkward way, lean form tipped forwards a little and then rocking backwards on scuffed Converse sneakers, hands shoved into his hoodie pockets. Before the nod comes and he gives a quiet smile, fiddling in the depths of a pocket for one of the familiar rolled-up sticks he nearly always has on hand. Yeah, he just kind of keeps them shoved in there. )

Don't worry, it's uh. Nothing weird. Just normal weed.

( He's not sure the woman who's been drinking and crying would be particularly concerned about that fact or not, but he's still going to clarify before handing her the joint, then offering a lighter, too. )

Think I'd go crazy in this place without it.

[ She doesn't mind him lingering if he's going to share his weed, at least. And maybe she should know better, accepting a smoke from some random guy off the street in a place where nothing is anywhere close to what it seems. But she's just plain out of fucks to give right now, and any chance to numb herself she'll take without question.

Whether or not she believes it's normal doesn't seem to matter. She takes the joint and the lighter, burning it at one end and taking a long, slow drag. Holding it in her lungs a moment, she tips her head up to exhale, her breath still shaky against the raw emotion of it all. ]

Think I'm going crazy regardless. [ She passes the joint over to him. ] Thanks.

You can keep it. I've got more. ( Peter gives another shy smile, finding another joint from his pocket and placing it inbetween his teeth as he reaches for the lighter to get it going. Then there's a slow drag of his own, and although the effects aren't immediate, Peter finds some kind of mental relief just by the gesture alone. )

I know that feeling, though. Every day's some new shit in this place.

( Though he doesn't know her circumstances, there's a genuine empathy there in his voice, because he does get it. Being here comes with fresh forms of suffering. When one thing ends, another one starts up (which is one reason he walks around with pot on hand, ready to get high whenever he needs to). )

Are you new to this place, or been here a while? Both ways have to be just as bad.

Thanks. [ She murmurs softly, not much effort put into the attempt at a smile she gives him back. She takes another drag, holding it in thoughtfully a moment as she stares at the ground. It's a minuscule comfort to the pain that's threatening to overtake her, but the habit, the easy motion of it does have its place.

She exhales, as if there's some way the smoke can expel some part of the pain from her lungs. As if it can, at the very least, dull the edges of it for just a moment. ]

Been here a while. Was in the old place, too. You?

Same. ( Peter answers quietly, with a little dip of his head. Solidarity for becoming a resident of some freaky nightmare city not once, but twice. There's another slow drag, and he's welcoming the smell of the smoke, potent and heady and familiar. )

....Though I chose to come to this one. ( Unlike Deerington, where he woke up even when he didn't want to, where it wasn't a choice at all to keep on living when back home all he wanted was to die. Trench is different. When everything was crumbling, he held someone's hand and walked through the Door.

Peter hesitates again, not wanting to risk upsetting the woman further. His voice stays very soft. )

Did you... want to? Come here.

[ She nods quietly. It's odd, that so many of them here share the same past and are just now crossing paths. All the danger, the darkness they all went through together. It bonds them in ways she's not sure she could explain if she tried.

Her brow furrows as he speaks, the numbness starting to spread across her fingertips, her lips. ]

No. [ She'd gone back home for a while. Said her goodbyes, left it all behind her. ] But he was here too, so. It seemed okay. [ Her sucks in a breath, shaking her head. ] You have people here?

( He was here... Oh. Peter looks down again, pretty sure he knows what that means. That loss, that ache, the one that won't ever go away. He'd lost many people over time in Deerington, but his first Trench loss was a couple of months ago. It was one of his best friends, and he still hasn't really processed it. He doesn't know how to. He doesn't want it to be real. )

Yeah. Some are gone now, but— most aren't. ( He knows he's lucky for that, for the fact that several of his loved ones from Deerington are still here. The person he loves the most in this world is still with him. But it doesn't make the losses any easier to swallow. )

The guy who was here. ( The one she'd mentioned, the one who made it seem okay to be here. ) He's... gone now?

Edited 2022-04-20 05:00 (UTC)

[ Maybe it's easier, not to process it. To drown it in liquor and weed and anger instead. It's not healthy, no, not even slightly - but right now, it's all she can muster.

She takes another hit, furrowing a brow at the ground as she holds the smoke in a moment, then releases it. ]

Good. It's easier, you know? Having people here. [ She frowns, nodding at his question. ]

Yeah. For good. As good as it can be, in a place like this.

( Peter offers a soft nod of his own, a wordless agreement to what she says about having people here, how it makes it easier. It does — and he pauses, before he adds on to the thought. )

If it wasn't for them... I don't think I'd have made it this far.

( It's maybe a pretty macabre thing to voice, but it's only true. He wouldn't be here. If not dead — since they're not even allowed that permanent luxury — then he'd have lost himself to his inner demons a long time ago. And in Peter's case, those are quite literal.

But he's looking back up at the woman, and he can't hide the wounded way his eyes look as she confirms what he'd probably already known. )

I'm sorry. ( He is, and it hurts. Peter pauses, swallowing against the tight feeling of his throat. )

Did you get to say goodbye?

[ She thought it might get easier, eventually. The impermanence of this place and the last. Watching people come and go. But the longer she's stayed, the deeper those relationships have gotten. The harder it is to watch it all just... disappear.

She nods at his sentiment, something tightening in her throat at the thought. Of how far they'd come, of how she'd just assumed their time back together would've lasted a little longer.

She doesn't need his apology, but it tugs her heart further down into her stomach when she gets it. The tears start to blur her vision again, and stubbornly she blinks them away. Not now. Not in front of him.

Instead, she shakes her head at his question, taking another drag of the blunt to buy herself some time to recover. ]

Does anyone, in this place?

( He's starting to really feel it now, the familiar lull. Peter only ever smokes what calms him down — the slow, peaceful stuff. The kind it's easy to become numb to.

Still, he can hear his heartbeat thudding dully in his own ears at her question. He's never, ever talked about this. Just shoved it up under the rug inside himself. He's quiet for a few moments longer. Her question could be rhetorical, but.... )

When my best friend left, he.... knew. Beforehand. Somehow, he knew he was gonna leave.

( Diarmuid came to him explicitly, told him about a certain longing to return to the sea. Peter begged him not to go, like a child. Cried a little. Clung a lot. )

I got to say goodbye. But... I'm not sure I'm happy I did. Because I keep looking back and wishing I'd said it better, you know?

( Not that it's easier when people just disappear without any chance to say goodbye, but.... Peter has some regrets about it. Looking back, he wishes he'd done more during that final interaction. Hugged longer. Said better things. )

[ The weed helps in the sense that she feels just that little bit detached from her body. It's not any less painful - she's sure of it. But it helps dull the ache of it just for a moment.

She presses her lips together, feeling the buzz of it against her skin. Eyebrows knitting, she wrinkles her nose, content on focusing on the pain of a different story to try and distract from her own. ]

That's the problem, isn't it? Not knowing if it hurts more to get to say goodbye or not.

[ She sucks in a breath, shaking her head. ] It's regret, either way.

It's been a while and Herc can definitely say he's seen Sara in far better states than this. Enough so that at first he's not entirely what he's seeing.

On recognising Sara and the obvious signs of upset, he slowly picks his way to the front of the house and calls from a few feet away, "Hey? You all right there?"

She shouldn't be out here like this. She hates the feeling, the vulnerability of it, the way that losing Booker feels like the whole damn ground has been pulled out from under her.

She's got her palms pressed to her eyes, struggling to even her breathing when she hears the voice. Head perking up, she wipes hurriedly at her eyes and sucks in a breath.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm..." She trails off, something tightening in her throat at the attempt to finish the sentence.

Herc wavers and comes to a stop right in front of the seated woman, digging in his coat pocket for a handkerchief and passing it over to her.

"Handling it?" he finishes for her, voice quiet and gentle.

She hesitates, taking the handkerchief and letting out a soft, miserable attempt at a laugh.

"Something like that." She sucks in a breath, wiping at her cheeks and nose in an attempt to pull herself together.

Crouching down so they're at eye-level with each other, he lets Sara have a moment to try to tidy her face. Knowing the sort of stuff that goes on in the Trench and how tough this woman is, he knows whatever has upset her has to be bad.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

She struggles to compose herself, determined to piece herself together now that there's someone to see her crumble. Vulnerability's not a feeling that sits well with her - even if this place tends to push those boundaries whenever it sees fit.

She shakes her head, shifting a little on the stoop so he's got room to sit.

"I'm... I'll be alright. Really."

"You will be, sure," Herc agrees quietly enough, giving her another long stare before shuffling around to take the offered seat. "But even I can see you're not right now, which is saying something."

He makes a point of not turning his head to stare at Sara, keeping his eyes fixed firmly ahead to not put her further on the spot. "How bad is it?"

She'll be fine. She's been through hell more than once, she can do it again.

Somehow, that notion doesn't help in the slightest. She stares down at her hands as he takes a seat next to her, chewing on her lip as he speaks. She and Herc have known each other a while, but he's never seen her like... this. Not many have.

She swallows heavily, struggling to get the words out until finally, she manages. "He's gone."

Herc stills, knowing just how serious a seemingly simple statement like that can be, here.

"... Dead, or... gone?" he asks quietly, scouring his mind for the last time he'd seen Booker. Honestly, though, which is worse? Some of them have homes and lives to return to. Death isn't exactly final in the Trench. Does he actually want people to be trapped in the Trench with all its horrors?

She can feel the rigidity in his muscles, and somehow the fact that he knows makes it all the more real. That gone means gone. Not dead, because that can mean all sorts of things in a place like.

"Gone," she says quietly, a shaky breath following. "I saw him." Walked right back into the ocean that had brought them here, like he'd been taken over. Empty.

He's got no justification to drop by this time. Not that he thinks he needs it, but it isn't as though he can return the hospitality by inviting her over to his place. They'd either spend the time sprawled under the tree of his latest lean-to, or huddled between the archives of John's shop, and neither is quite as hospitable as the place she and Booker keep.

Usually, at least. Wrench can feel something in the air well before he sees Sara there on the steps. It puts a lump of something in his throat. Homesickness, maybe, if he were prone to the sensation. But his belly is full of loss already when she hears his footsteps and lifts her head and he can see her red-rimmed eyes.

What happened? he's still a ways off. It'd be an awkward distance to call between, but that's just one of the benefits of ASL. Wrench quickens his pace, but doesn't drop his hands. Is someone hurt?

He doesn't need justification to come by. Never does. Wrench and Sara, they're good at leaving each other to their own devices. Good at finding each other whenever it's right, whenever the whim strikes.

Or whenever they both need it most. There's not much in the world right now that can give her any type of comfort, but seeing Wrench might just do it. Still, her eyes fill with tears again the moment she sets eyes on him, because telling anyone - telling him especially - means it's real.

She waves off the question, sucking in a breath to try and pull herself together as he approaches.

He's gone.

Who? It's a reflexive sort of question. People come and go with the kind of frequency that makes asking justifiable, even if Wrench is sure he doesn't have to ask. He doesn't wait for an answer, either. Instead, he takes a seat on the step alongside her and folds one arm around her shoulders. Without as much as another word, Wrench hugs Sara to his side. For a moment when they touch the pain seems almost overwhelming. It knocks the air out of his lungs and reminds him of his own unhealed pain. The gaps inside his chest left by the men in his own life he's still missing.

I'm sorry. He releases her with the arm furthest away to sign, though he's still gripping her with the other. There are a million questions he might like to ask, but none of them seem that pressing now.

Who. The question aches at her, makes that hole he's left behind so much more apparent. The person who'd anchored her through this goddamn place and the last. The person she'd worried day in and day out that she'd lose, so much so that she'd fought being with him in the first place.

And it's finally happened. Like she knew it would, but that doesn't keep the rug from slipping out from under her anyway.

She doesn't even notice him draw closer until he's already there, and she sinks into his side, face turning to bury into the crook of his shoulder as she lets out a miserable sob into his shirt. She glances up to watch his gesture for just a moment, arms wrapping tight around him. Her breath comes in stuttered, half-breaths that don't seem to quite fill up her lungs, and in the safety of his arms, she crumbles.

The sob that wracks her travels through Wrench like a jolt of electricity, and he sets his palm against the back of her head and eases her against him. For the first time since he's been practicing the boundaries of his new abilities, he feels how close they are. Wrench knows he could reach into that raw core of Sara's pain and soothe it away. It would be so easy to stop her tears and leave her with nothing more than a gentle blanket of numbness. He doesn't do it, though. She deserves to feel it, just as much as he still feels the ache of his own loss. It's painful and inconsolable at times, but it's a reminder of all the good he was able to have, even if it was too short.

Instead, he hugs her fiercely and smooths his fingers through her hair and between her shoulders. Wrench can only begin to imagine what it must take for Sara to let herself break down like this. To seem vulnerable or scared or sad. It's the kind of thing the both of them try so damn hard to hide all of the time.

It's okay, he thinks as gently as he can, letting the words in his mind push forward towards hers. I've got you. Let it come. It's okay.

So much of her life before this place had been spent willing herself to be numb. To fight, to hunt, to carry out the mission cold and calculated, to distance herself from anyone willing to get close. Deerington had changed all that. Forced her to make connections, forced her to care about the people she'd forged friendships with in the darkness of it all.

Leonard had been the first of them. The first person she thought she might be able to have more with, and when he'd disappeared she'd sworn to herself she wouldn't let it happen again. To let anyone in that close was asking for pain in a place like this, and even if Booker had known it, he'd insisted they be together anyway.

Fuck him for being the one to leave first. It sure as hell doesn't feel worth it now, when the pain of loss is so fresh, when it cuts into her chest ice cold and twists in deep.

She doesn't have the energy to keep the walls up anymore. Not with the strength, the steadiness of Wrench's arms around her, not with the whisper in the back of her mind to let go. So she does. She cries into his chest with all she's got, and she's not sure for how long - just that by the time it's done, she barely has the strength to sit upright.

When Sara finally gives up the last of the fight to keep any of what's coming concealed, Wrench is certain he can feel his own heart breaking too. He sets his head on top of hers and closes his eyes, letting her own sobs wrack and shudder against his chest. The agony is almost dizzying, so disorienting he can't keep their pain straight for much longer. Soon it's as though it's his own, and in the back of his mind he sees the faces of the men he's lost, too. Grady comes first and most clearly, but behind him are the rest: Logan and Jean-Paul and Kurt, all just as he remembers them the last time he saw them all at the cabin.

He wonders if they're back home, and what that means. If Grady went back to Minnesota only to die in earnest. If the rest of them found the paradise they'd been promised. He knows none of them remember him, and he doesn't know whether to be glad for it or utterly infuriated that so much history could be erased as though it was nothing at all. Wrench wonders if Booker's back home, too.

It seems the most unfair to think he is. He knows that's not where the man wanted to be. The memory of the two of them standing before that wall of smoke and flame, of making the decision to greet it when it came... Trench isn't what either of them wanted, but it gave Book and Sara more time together. It's hard to say whether that's a blessing or a curse.

Wrench doesn't realize he's crying, too, until he's as spent as her, arm in arm and trembling in the aftershocks of the catharsis of that raw emotion. He steels his breath and pulls away, forcing his own calm without demanding the same of her.

Come on, he says instead. We should find you something to eat.

It's a small bit of comfort, knowing he's here with her. Knowing he was close to Booker, too, that he feels the pain of that loss alongside her. He's lost people, too. People close to him, over and over again. And it's not until now she's born the brunt of just how much that hurts.

Would it help, if they had any sort of answers? If they knew for sure that their loved ones had gone back to their own world, back to the home they'd known? Or would it just hurt all that much more, knowing whatever they'd built together here and in the last place had been wiped clean for them?

He'd chosen to stay. Between this place and Deerington, Booker hadn't chosen home. She should've brought him with her. Should've brought him to Starling, should've bought just a little more time with him. That's the thing about loss. The bargaining, the what-ifs, the should-haves just keep you spiraling on and on until you're not quite sure which way is up.

She doesn't realize he's crying too until she finally looks up at him, at the loss written on his own features, at the pain reflected there. She reaches up to wipe at his cheeks, a small gesture, something warm that she needs more than he might.

She wants to say no. That she's not hungry, that there's nothing much she can stomach right now. But she's all out of fight, and all she can do is give him a short nod, a tremble of a breath in her lungs as she gets to her feet.

To the Bottom of the Bottle

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cw: ~recreational drugs

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