A/N: In which Mr. House plays therapist for our punished little troublemaker.
Where do they go?
Those smoke rings I blow each night,
Oh, what do they do, those circles of blue and white?
Why do they seem to picture a dream?
Why do they fade that phantom parade of love?
Blow, blow them into air, silky little rings
Blow, blow them everywhere, give your troubles wings.
- "Smoke Rings", by The Mills Brothers
"Hello?"
She'd know that regal voice anywhere, it stood out like a Gomorrah whore among Westside hookers. Though that comparison did it a massive disservice. Her eyelids cracked open, revealing two bloodshot, light blue eyes, and she blinked away the blur that had taken up residence in most of her vision.
"Eris, answer me or I'm sending a securitron in there to remove you." He sounded worried, but that must have been her mishearing it. House never worried. Out loud.
That got her attention quickly, and she peered around to find that she was sitting in something very cold – surrounded by it actually. Ah, that'll be the bath. So, she'd done the absolutely legendary, successful-person move, and had fallen asleep in the bathtub while crying.
"No need!" She tries to reassure, but her voice is hoarse from sleep, and she notices that half of her hair is wet while the top is dry, making it the veritable height of attractive. "Fell asleep while taking a bath, no need to assemble the troops to come and get me, but I'm touched all the same." It sounded more biting than she wanted it to, and she pursed her lips at the snark she hadn't meant to use. Everything that left her lips sounded either insincere, rude, and only occasionally, genuinely intelligent. Sometimes, they all went nicely together.
Well, she was legitimately a bit touched by it. Evidently, he'd been watching as he always did, and if she was any lesser of a person, she might tease him by calling him a creep, but that sounded like the kind of insult that would disturb his delicate, prewar sensibilities. Besides, it was those prewar manners that appealed to her the most, and likely contributed to the multitude of reasons that she can say with confidence that he's her favorite person out here, not that there's any riveting competition.
Prunish wrinkles covered her hands and feet, and the cold of the water bothered her to the extent that she nearly leapt out, searching for the nearest bath towel. Her reflection looked the part of her spirit – foolish and beaten, though at least she was really, truly clean, in contrast to what she'd been for months. Soap was a luxury of the first world, even though she knew for a fact that soap could be made of rendered fats and essential oils, though that was a touch too decadent for the spartan existence that the Legion tried to cultivate. Hopeless, was the word she'd use for that manner of people, which she could say now that she was rid of them.
On the wall of the bathroom were rows of clothing, displayed by someone with hosting skills that this current world just didn't deserve. She put on the closest available blouse, a familiar article of clothing that now hung off of her body, and paired it with some pajama pants – striped or something, she usually didn't put too much thought into what she wore if she wasn't going anywhere, and for the moment, she was just thankful that they smelt reasonably clean.
"So, how long was I out?" She asked the ceiling, taking a few drinks from the sink like the shameless cavewoman that she actually was.
Water was good. She'd forgotten to get a drink before her bath, and now she held her mouth underneath the tap indiscriminately.
Right – the cigarettes. A cigarette would be smart, if one stretched their mental faculties enough. A good thing then, that this is precisely where she excelled at the most. When she's done slurping water out of the faucet, which she reasons came straight out of the Colorado, she does the next thing that would logically follow what she'd just done, and wiped her mouth and chin on the pretty blouse.
"Four hours. Normally, intruding on your private moments is out of the question, but the circumstances called for it." She nods at the matter-of-face tone in his voice, and opens the door to the bathroom, making a beeline for the elevator after grabbing her cigarettes and a lighter.
It wasn't so bad, having someone looking after her, even if he's doing it out of some crafty end, like keeping her in his employ. Or, it could be some kind of charming, prewar gentlemanly notion that led him to inquiring on a lady, but she's never acted much like a lady, so that's unlikely. The first is probably the wisest course to assume, as it was tried and true, though she's not usually one for anything that's tried and true.
"Oh, you can intrude on my private moments anytime they catch your fancy. Would rather it be you than some soulless block of wood in the Legion, that's for damn sure." The elevator opened, and she moves to sit down at the bar, putting a cigarette between her lips, and lighting it.
The flip lighter had been neglected for some time now, and it takes a few tries before it produces a full flame.
"What's been going on here since I.. left?" She asked, testing the words on her tongue.
Lighting the cigarette was a spiritual experience really, and the first inhale went straight to her head, causing that familiar, blissfully dizzy feeling it had caused in the beginning, reminiscent of the first cigarette she ever smoked. For a hot minute, all that happened could be forgotten, for as long as it burned. She could pretend that she was here talking with House, as she once had – without any strings attached. Of course, that wasn't true at all, because everything had changed, and she was probably better for it, but everyone had a right to sulk every now and then.
"Nothing substantial. A couple of murders occurred in plain sight in Gomorrah, under the oversight of Cachino, and it took longer than it should have to wipe from the fickle memories of the people." She scoffed in good spirit at the mention of Cachino, a name from what felt like a different life. "There has been strikingly little news from the NCR, only that there is supposedly a plant in their higher ranks, which they wouldn't want the public to know. Although, we can expect information like that to be leaked to the public, if former democracies are any indication."
A Legion plant, she assumed. Who else? It certainly couldn't be one of House's, since a machine would surely stand out. She snorted at that, exhaling a bit of smoke as she did so. Eris caught the hesitation at saying 'Legion', which she appreciated, but it was wholly unnecessary – she may be unerringly juvenile, but she didn't need her hand held in these kinds of areas.
"For a moment, I thought you were about to suggest that the plant was yours. I'd love to see Victor playing the part of a lieutenant in the NCR, big trooper helmet and all." She moved her hand around, trailing smoke with her, as she gestured to her head. "And Cachino. I never would have expected shit to implode under his consummate leadership. The man is a fucking mastermind surrounded by idiots, just like me." She joked lamely, shaking some ash off in a ceramic cup.
It was so strange, she thought, to be discussing politics with him, and she felt extremely out of practice, though it would all come back eventually.
When the cigarette was spent, she twisted around in the stool to look outside of the massive windows overlooking the rest of the Mojave. At least twenty-four hours must have passed since she got back, because it was nighttime, and she knew it wasn't the same night.
He scoffed at what she said, a small noise that was shorter than hers, yet more dramatic somehow. It was the emotion behind it that loaned it that quality, the emotion of a lonely egghead extremely frustrated by the small troubles that ruled others.
"Is that so? I distinctly recall your incessant complaints concerning Cachino, whom you decided to co-conspire with, not I." She snickered at the seriousness with which he quipped, said rare action of his needed supreme talent to identify. Luckily, she was equipped, for the most part. "Cachino this, and Cachino that. I see your opinions have changed, not that I'm surprised."
She smirked at that, and her white teeth gleamed underneath the moonlight that was shining through the large, penthouse windows. Nothing compared to cutting up with someone, especially someone who could give and take, after months of solitude and 're-education'. It was nothing short of bliss, even if she still felt like she was missing about half of her brain cells from that lifelong slumber she'd had. If this easy-going moment between them could last forever, she'd take it, because it would be simpler than the reality that's waiting for her.
Telling him all that occurred was not on her list of desirable things to do upon regaining her freedom, but it had to happen. If she didn't tell someone, she was going to burst asunder.
"You're so funny, when you're not trying to be." She said with mocking sweetness, crossing her arms, letting her legs dangle off the stool as she turned side to side. "You never asked about what happened between the Hidden Valley fiasco and now. Since I spent half a year with your overly warm and pleasant voice in my ear, I know you're dying to hear it. Despite all attempts to do so, you can't fool me into believing that you don't love a good story."
"Whatever the story is about, I'm sure it's anything but 'good'." He replied above and around her, filling the entire room with the sound – it was never easy to tell where it was coming from. "Naturally, your affairs are your own. Prying into the private life of others has never been something I make a habit of."
Her eyebrows raised at that, and she couldn't find a flaw in what he said. It was accurate, and further, it was something she could respect, a lofty detail indeed.
"Remember when you said you didn't want to hear my, what was it, 'primate triumph'?" She hummed after that, and continued, "Would you say the same thing now, if I wanted to tell you how they got me? Who knows, maybe you'll learn from the mistakes I made, because Lord knows I won't."
"I suppose you've earned my attention, a hundred-fold." His tone was somewhat solemn, a thoroughly disconcerting sound to her ears. Surely, he didn't actually feel bad for her, or perhaps she's misjudging him. Either way, it wouldn't be the first time that had happened. "You did as I asked," (as if she'd been asked instead of peer pressured, but she appreciated that touch nonetheless) "and eliminated the Brotherhood of Steel. In the process of doing so, you were captured by Caesar's Legion, whom you were held by for three months. Because I am your employer, I will take partial responsibility, though only on account of who you were captured by."
Fair. Although, she couldn't rightly blame him for any of it. Her moral dilemma regarding the Brotherhood of Steel had been resolved (mostly), and in its place, sat an even heavier weight. Aimlessness was the root of nearly all of her troubles, kept alive mostly by a revolting indifference on the value of other people. If she'd been even half as motivated as Benny, for instance, she would've never ended up in that shack in Cottonwood Cove, forced to consume the product of her indiscretion.
He didn't deserve to have that on his shoulders. That is, he didn't deserve to have to sit with any trickle of guilt, a feeling that she could only assume was rare for a mindful person such as he. Though, on that note, that was assuming it was guilt that he felt. Guilting others into spilling their secrets was a habit of hers, one she didn't want to shake, for she preferred deception to outright murder if it could be afforded. But guilting Mr. House? Months ago, maybe it would've been a fun enterprise, but now? She wasn't really feeling it. It shocked her that that was irksome.
"'Partial responsibility'? How about none at all? Any guilt you might have is unfounded. I made enemies out of someone I shouldn't have, which happens in times of turmoil owing to war." She shrugged, a neutral movement that came as easily to her as breathing. "If anyone's wholly responsible, it's me. I was held accountable for my actions, just like every other fool out in the wasteland is, and because I have a fraction more smarts than them, I was able to run from it for so long. Don't take responsibility for my stupidity. I know it's desirable, I know you want it for yourself, but it's mine." That last bit was said more in a growl than anything, though there was no hostility in it. It was simply a juvenile attempt to bright light to something that was lightless.
A bot swerved up behind her, and she flinched at the sound before turning around and finding a plate of food staring at her. It was eggs in a tortilla, with beans and a sliced pear beside it. A veritable luxury, if she's the judge.
"Guilt is too harsh a word for you to use, and it isn't what I had in mind. Notwithstanding the assumptions you've made of me, I do not tend to approach things with an archaic sense of despotism. Those traits lie with the man who ordered your capture. If Caesar sends one of his little spies to gather information, and the spy's identity is compromised in the meantime, any harm done to said spy is something Caesar should answer for, though he doesn't, because the world he wants to build doesn't engender a sense of mutual dignity. This is, to me, as you can imagine, disgusting?" He left the word as a question, as if he was searching for the right word and that one sufficed in lieu of another one. "Ergo, I don't treat my right hand as a disposable slave to be replaced upon her first mistake. Simple enough?" It was a phrase he liked to use a lot, similarly to how most people used 'are you following?', or 'does that make sense?'.
Though she wanted to eat with gusto, she knew what would be coming if she ate all of it in less than a minute, so she tries very hard to contain herself. It wasn't easy – the beans were better than anything she'd had in months.
What he said made sense, and she could agree that it was a commendable way of approaching things that was equally archaic as Caesar's was, only it was from a different time entirely. Not a time of Roman bathhouses and slaves, but a time of technological progress and a different kind of freedom than she's accustomed to here. But, she's always been dazzled by old world values and ideas, mostly in the three or four centuries leading up to, and encompassing, the time that House had lived in. Perhaps that's why she keeps coming back to him – because he holds all the cards for that which she covets the most.
"Nothing is simple enough for me, my mind is melting as it is. I need you to simplify it even further, please." She banters, in between forkfuls of beans and the crunch of the eggs and toasted tortilla. He sighs heavily, as he was known to do, but she was pitiable even to him, and so he tolerated it, she thinks. "Only kidding, of course. I never knew you held such lofty values, or standards, for that matter. One could reasonably assume it, from the amount of effort you put into a very small pool of those who work directly for you, which I hope is compromised mostly of me, unless you're living a double life I'm not aware of. Aside from that, I can admit that it's refreshing that someone embodies the ideals they propose, and has high standards which they work ceaselessly to meet, because most people are not that big, including me."
She had her doubts that he was always the bigger person like that. No one could ever be that consistent, and thus she predicted that he had his moments where he could not follow his own standards as strictly as he liked. But lapses in judgment were the spice of life, and she didn't think that was cause for nitpicking, unless it was just about anyone else.
How had they branched off to this, when it began as an interlude to how the frumentarii had found her? Well, that was just how their conversations went – she somehow managed to always direct it someplace else, and he was so eager to answer questions she was eager to ask, that it just flowed like that for the most part.
"The bunker was easy to infiltrate, because I'd been fortunate enough to run into a renegade Brotherhood scribe on the road, a happening that can only be contributed to my chancy luck. Veronica got me in, it was about one of, if not the most, scummy things I've ever done, and I thought about it for a long time afterward. Everyone down there was hypervigilant, as you might assume, since the great majority of them had spent years below ground, ignorant of what was going on in the surface. Ignorant not only of that, but of scheming surface dwellers, funnily enough. They approached me with a naivete you wouldn't believe, or maybe you would, and you know where this leads – something about their inevitable doom rooted in chivalrous gestures toward outsiders who don't wish them well." She finished her plate then. So much for moderation.
Afterwards, she drained the glass of water sitting next to it in an impressive span of ten seconds, and wiped at the corners of her mouth with a cloth that lay on the bar counter.
"Very good eggs, by the way. No one seems to stock eggs from birds anymore, I'm afraid." She commented blithely, watching closely the robot who took the plate away from her to a chute on the wall.
The story was all she had now, to remind her of something that happened that the Legion would never talk about. What would happen now that they'd been defied so royally? Would she be a regular Joshua Graham-like figure, proof to some critically thinking legionaries that their system was rigged to fail, and not as infallible as they were made to believe? Still, she had no personal issues with the Legion as a whole, only with one or two individuals that had unnecessarily made her life a nightmare while she was there, one of which was in Cottonwood Cove, and the other was a slave woman. Understanding things was a sure method for calming anything emotionally charged, like a personal vendetta against a system that was designed to be impersonal, which didn't benefit her in the slightest. But even she had her lapses in understanding, and she wanted nothing more for the centurion than to be scourged and crucified by his own people.
"These are the little things that those outside of Vegas have forgotten. A design that caters minimally to their political needs is only half of the equation, while the other half are the worldly comforts, conditions that remind them that they are human, and not animals to be herded." He added, a very cerebral answer to something that had been a passing observation.
It was interesting that he was able to do that, and she'd thought for a long time that she was the only person that sifted through seemingly minuscule and pointless little things and found in them just a piece of a jigsaw puzzle in dire need of repair. But she wasn't, because he often had her beaten by a long mile. Under his gaze, everything was philosophized, the mundane became paramount, and was viewed as equal in value to the overt. The downside, she suspected, was detachment from the very same mundanity that he could claim to understand the utility of.
"That's something I noticed while in the Legion's custody. It isn't just in the collars they lock onto slave's necks, or the legionaries they lash for shedding a tear. There's always more to it than that. It's in the little things too – the same meal everyday, the open secret that if you die, you will be replaced by someone else in an instant. In several ways, it makes you wildly grateful towards being able to exist in that system even if it's only for a small dip in time, because the alternatives are always held over your head, like when a preacher keeps the threat of hell over a believer, and the relationship is so co-dependent that the believer can't help but thank the preacher for keeping him in line and offering peace of mind at the cost of everything else. That's no way to live, only to survive, for the sake of surviving, which is ultimately pointless."
She then went on to explain, "This is what is done in most societies, I think. Convincing the people that the only other alternatives to how they're living are death, among other things, when that isn't true at all. In the Legion, they get you by serving prisoners and slaves the exact same meals that officers and legionaries are eating, it's a subliminal way of reinforcing that you are part of the collective, and isn't it so freeing to be a part of a whole where you are equally as worthless and unavoidably inferior to Caesar as everyone else is? It's sickening, now that I've lived it. The first thing they did to me was feed me maize mash that everyone in Cottonwood Cove was eating, and simultaneously removed the eyes of someone in a different cage because I was talking to my cellmate when I shouldn't have been."
That was the first time she'd ever mentioned the Weathers boy out loud, and the memory of a destroyed, youthful face appeared in her mind's eye then, and she closed her eyes and huffed audibly against that train of thought.
"It turns people into abused children with major co-dependent family issues. Never truly rewarded, and only ever punished. But, who am I to judge? I'm not a great leader nor mover." She quipped at the end, mocking the people in power who scoffed at criticisms made against their rule by those who didn't have the experience in leading.
"All good points, I think. Your experience with them lends you a rather large shred of authority on the matter. No one needs to be in a position of power to criticize it, much of my professional life relied on criticizing the existing system of governance in the United States. Although, if you are prepared to criticize it, you need to be prepared to defend your word when it's attacked, something few are terribly keen to do. The issue lies with the many who are willing to complain, yet unwilling to be proactive. NCR citizens, much like the American citizens that predated them, aren't pleased with where their precious democracy has led them, though they will languor, and rest on their laurels, if only their life can be the peaceable exception to the ruination of everyone else's." He voiced, an echo of his long feud with prewar America coating everything he'd just said.
Imagining him as someone who walked around and gave interviews to the press about all the flaws in the world they lived in, was nothing short of entertaining. She could imagine it even now, a younger and more impassioned Robert House, driven to friendlessness and isolation because he spoke harsh truths that everyone needed to know, but didn't care about. She wondered when all that had changed, what had caused him to focus primarily on his own business, and his own city, rather than building and remaking the entire world in his vision, which she was sure he'd first intended.
"That's why I don't feel too guilty about irritating other people with questions they're not even fit to answer, and opinions that shock them. Mostly, opinions I don't even hold myself." She said, scratching at her chin in reflection of all the times she'd done just that. "I won't pretend to be virtuous every time I do it, I got a need for satisfaction just like everybody else, but there's always this vain hope that maybe it'll help them think about things more thoroughly."
She liked to think she knew exactly what he might say to that, what everyone would say to that. That, she was too abrasive, too silly, to ever have any kind of greater purpose than telling funnies for clout. Though, he was a smart cookie, even if his social graces repeatedly fell short. It didn't even bother her now, sitting in here and having a chat with him, the first chat of substance she'd had in so incredibly long. It was food for the soul, really.
"The pitiable reality of the Legion, for instance, is that if you even question anything they do, they immediately appeal to authority, no questions asked, no consideration. Nothing. It's more lashes on your back as soon as you even pop the question about how it makes sense to lash someone's back for being five minutes late to a fucking job. Sorry, steams me just thinking about it. I was talking to Antony, just about the only kind face there, and I had lost track of time, because that's what I do." Eris complained, feeling remarkably angry just thinking about how inefficient that 'efficient' system really was. "For talking to a cellmate, I had to watch this big brute of a centurion rip a young boy's eyes out of their sockets, and then afterwards…" She trailed off, "Afterwards, I got the ranger out, and a couple of others, but.. the boy never made it, and his mother died holding him in that canyon when she was supposed to be running away."
Her eyes glazed over then, looking out at the Mojave down below but not really seeing it. There was a gunfight going on out in the distance, or some such wasteland drama, probably an alpha raider trying to assert dominance.
"How do you know the boy never made it? Surely, you didn't linger behind to watch?" He asked considerately, and she shouldn't have been surprised that he saved courtesy like that only for very special instances. It soothed her somewhat, that he wasn't a whore who sold his consideration to anyone who asked for it.
"I didn't even get to watch. That was my first escape attempt, when I was still sitting, tied to a pole in Cottonwood Cove. You don't want to know how I know." She half-mumbled, a part of her aching to tell someone the story, but afraid all the same that he'd think it was disgusting, that she was disgusting for making the choice to do it.
That had been half the dilemma – that the centurion had offered her a choice, and she reasoned that cannibalism was better than losing her tongue. What had it been that she thought? Something along the lines of 'better to keep quiet about it, than to only be able to write about it'. There had undoubtedly been a measure of vanity surrounding the decision, she couldn't imagine not ever being able to use her voice again, and not have her tongue curl around her most favorite words. It was easy to define all of that underneath the convenient little blanket term of 'vanity', although retaining one's voice was less of a vanity and more of a human right. Although deep remorse can, and often does, cloud the judgment.
For her, self-loathing is better than blaming another person, primarily because she can't amass enough hatred for other people, when it's all expended on herself. It came naturally, oddly enough, though she was well aware that it too, had its flaws. She'd lived through it now. Perhaps, she thinks, allowing oneself to hate others isn't so bad if it leads them to taking revenge on a monster like the centurion.
"Let's assume that I did want to know. How would you tell it?" He asked.
Woah, was that tactfulness coming from him? It caused her to worry that bit of skin in between her two brows, and a crease formed.
"You'd hate me if I told you, but I'm getting a feeling that you'd hate me if I didn't, if only because I kept you in suspense." She stared petulantly at the scene below, moonlight shining on her mostly dried hair, showcasing how limp and colorless it had become from malnutrition.
"Certainly, because I make a habit of hating others for conditions which they had little control over." He replied, deadpan as always.
Eris cracked a smile at that, and chuckled quietly to herself at the way he tended to approach anything humorous, a rare occasion. Or maybe it wasn't, and he really did have a human side that he showed when people like her weren't bullying him.
"Aurelius of Phoenix. I don't know if you ever heard any tale about him. From what I understand, he's second to the Legate in atrocities, only he's infamous for the cruelty, and not the greater purpose of the cruelty."
"He isn't known to me, no. Do go on, though." He cut in.
She did, and clenched her teeth before continuing the story of how her life had changed forever, in ways she couldn't name, but were there nonetheless.
"Aurelius is a centurion, apparently he's fourth, or… fifth, in line, after Vulpes Inculta, I think. He came from a tribe that, when their enemies were conquered, would then force feed them the flesh of their fallen comrades. To demoralize, he'd said. To quote Aurelius, 'it reinforces a kind of submission that common atrocities like rape cannot. Those kinds of spoils of war are just that: spoils, done only for the gain of the soldier.'" She scoffs, and lights a cigarette, because she's about to need it. "Yeah. He's the kind of person you wouldn't let around kids, the kind of person who would've been doing time in your world.
"Anyhow, he was in charge of operations at Cottonwood Cove. His men feared him more than they respected him, which was a potent mix in the Legion, way, way, way too common. I think it was the.. fourth or fifth night I had been in the Cove, when I got a cellmate, an NCR ranger named Erasmus, he was the one who must have told Swank where I was, who in turn, told you where I was. We talked a bit in our cell, got to know each other, you know. Canyon Runner had been the slave master at the Cove, the one who conditions prisoners for shipping them across the river. Well, the day after the Weathers boy was punished for me and Erasmus'," She paused and corrected herself, inhaling some smoke as she did so, "My crime, I cooked up a plan to escape. Mind, I didn't actually think it would go well enough to get everyone except me out of there.
"I managed to untie the knot that Canyon Runner had tied my hands with. He was legendary at rope tying, by the way." She added, for effect. "And lured him into the cell me and the ranger were in. It was the last mistake he ever made, because I tripped him, and choked him to death, stole the keys, and broke the others out. They all ran for it, and because Erasmus was armed with a rifle he'd gotten off of Canyon Runner, it was pure chaos for a few minutes. Looking back, it feels like that fiasco lasted for hours, but.. it was probably only a few minutes, to tell you the truth, if even five minutes. That's pushing it.
"Evidently, Aurelius had his eyes on me that whole time, because before I got out into that canyon, I felt these arms dragging me backward. Boom, surprise, who could it be, but Aurelius of Phoenix? Resident psychopath, of course, he'd be the one. Because why not?" She shook her head, smoke filling the air around and above her. "He took me to that shack in the Cove, and he made me eat a part of another human. I can only assume it was one of the Weathers, but I can never know for sure, because I'd passed out after he grabbed me. But I know. I don't usually hold any belief with utmost conviction, but I know it was the boy. He told me, eat this, or I'll have your tongue, so I chose to keep my tongue."
Expectations are never as good as reality, and that's why she tends to keep them low. It felt good to get that out, though now she was worrying about what he might think of her, now that he'd heard the story of how far she really could fall. If she'd kept that bottled up, it'd fester indefinitely, and create a legionary out of her. Because that's what happened, to every single one of them.
Mr. House said nothing, likely processing that in his head, and she let him, for however long it would take. In the meantime, she hopped off of the stool to go and sit in front of the window, where she could get a better look at the outside world that she wasn't too excited to face again, anytime soon. There existed a frightening lack of initiative, to address his silence. Excuses danced around in her head about what he was doing, such as checking the cameras on the Strip, and wherever else he had them in the Mojave, but it was most likely that he was disgusted, and if not with Aurelius, then by her. She'd be too.
Telling him might have been a mistake. They'd never discussed anything too personal before, not until this discussion. But back then, she'd been laboring under the illusion that he was just a disposable piece that she could analyze and poke at for kicks. And he? She could only assume that nothing much had changed for him, for he hadn't been imprisoned or enslaved, hadn't had any event that would cause some kind of epiphany. To him, she was probably still just an annoying little fly that buzzed around him and occasionally said quirky and smart things.
"That is.. positively uncouth. How is it that an unlawful 'punishment' like that went unchecked by Caesar? Even Caesar has forbidden it, as I have within my own city." He sounded rightfully repulsed, and she could only hope that it wasn't at her.
How the circumstances had changed so radically, she wasn't sure. One day, she'd felt shockingly little for him, and the next, she considered him a friend and valued his thoughts on her. That wasn't something she wanted to give up lightly, but if she wanted to be honest with anyone, it was with a friend.
"Because I didn't tell anyone really, not until now. Even Inculta, he accosted me about it, and he doesn't know the extent of what Aurelius did. It isn't exactly a conversation starter. 'Hello, Praetorian. Mind if I have a word with Caesar about how one of his officers forced me to eat another human being as punishment, which he knew was forbidden?'" She mocked in a high-pitched voice.
She realized why he was surprised just then, by the faulty checks and balances of the Legion. It was because she usually couldn't keep her mouth shut about anything, and so she thought his question was intelligent.
"You know, it probably would've been better if he'd just raped me then and there, but that's just a different kind of pain. A pain I could probably have excused with primitive urges. Just a manifestation of every male's inner caveman. Whatever. I've read Freud, I know why rape happens. But this? I fear that I'll never get away from this." Why she was telling him this, was anyone's lucky guess. He didn't really deserve to have this dumped on him, but again, if she had a friend, then she'd like to be honest for once.
"I think you know that this is untrue, Eris. You're inventive, not of the common stock that is ruled by past hurts. That you can identify why it is so disturbing to you, tells me that you can, in equal measure, find a solution to the trouble it causes you. In robotics, I've always found that it is imperative to enter a hiccup with a solution already in mind, before diagnosing the issue. You can't reasonably hope for it to be resolved otherwise, at least, not in a practical span of time. And when the problem is found, and that solution you had in mind is inappropriate, you can at least say that you were thinking about the end result, and a better solution can be thought of."