[ Except Wash is pretty sure the only reason he was able to be talked down, convinced to see reason, was that he murdered Angela. And that's on them. But Wash isn't going to dump that on Carolina right now, even if she'll feel his guilt when she takes his hand. It could be from any number of things. Whatever. He keeps his hand out, waiting patiently, the frustration and disappointment that he'd locked down when in front of Sharkface creeping back now that it's just them. ]
We hoped for too much too fast.
[ He says it again to Carolina, trying to sound reasonable rather than bitter. Objectively, things like forgiveness take time, sometimes it never happens. This might be one of those things. He just hates that it feels like the blame, the punishment, is never going to end. ]
[ she's agreeing for his sake, because it sounds reasonable and rational and she needs to pretend she's a reasonable person until she actually can be again.
we hoped for too much. what had carolina even hoped for, really? a civil conversation? some conclusion that he could hate their guts and still be capable of ignoring it? it hadn't felt like too much. but it's still unsatisfying and just how easily she can see the disappointment in wash's face doesn't help.
like not being able to fix this has let him down again. like it's dumb luck and people who are practically strangers to thank for him not being hurt again at the hands of someone fucked over by project freelancer. like every time she thinks she has all of the director's bullshit patched up and dealt with, it comes back.
he's still breaking her family from beyond the grave. she's still paying for his crimes.
(and god, connie really did have the whole thing figured out, if only anyone could have talked to her.)
she lets her eyes close, takes a deep breath. ]
I'm sorry he found out who you were.
[ she's sorry for a lot of things, but she can voice that safely, at least. ]
Don't be. I was an idiot to think that I could even manage to make a friend in a month and a half, let alone that anything I did would make a difference.
[ His jaw works, gaze on Carolina's hands where they're gripping the sink. There's blood seeping from her knuckles to stain the porcelain, and Wash softens his voice a little. ]
[ other things might, when they're in a better place, when they banter, but not that. friendships can form fast and wash is nothing if not endearing.
which means she can't keep him at arm's length indefinitely, carolina taking a few more seconds to decide what's safe to think about - anger is easy, so's frustration, but she can keep the guilt away the way she used to keep her anxiety away from eta and iota. it's not there, not for them.
anything but temple, she tells herself, and finally lifts a hand to put it in his- cold to the touch and still dripping with water, but at least she's touching him.
except anything but temple drags her mind to a different memory and for the moment, it's too vivid to ignore.
a dark room, connie and a soldier opposite her, her pistol up. helmet tilted just enough that she can see tex out of the corner of her eye, because she doesn't trust the other agent. how could she possibly trust her, when she's such a large part of the reason york and maine are both hurt? when tex means the director tells carolina less than ever before?
"- And I won't take orders from a shadow."
"What did you just call me?"
she needs to stop this, deescalate. carolina tries to talk over tex: "You're coming with us, CT. This is your last chance."
"No, I'm not going anywhere with you."
"Actually, we don't need you. We just need your armour."
tex fires the first shot and, uncharacteristically, carolina freezes, rooted to the spot with an anguish she could never even begin to articulate. this isn't how this was supposed to go. they were supposed to talk, connie was supposed to agree to come back to the mother of invention, spitting mad but home. connie not coming back in more or less one piece isn't supposed to be an option.
the other three all move, though. connie's gotten so good at using her decoy and carolina almost wants to be proud, half rooting for her when she twists one of tex's arms behind her back and carolina can hear one of her knives sink into places knives aren't meant to go.
by the time tex hits the ground hard (no one's lucky enough for that to kill her, it just slows her for a moment) carolina isn't frozen anymore, darting out of the way of something sharp and weighted thrown at her before connie's there, slashing, driving carolina back a few steps before connie's blade tears the pistol from carolina's hand, sending it far out of reach.
(impressive, carolina wants to tell her, like this is just a training match where they've done that move a hundred times before. she doesn't have the skill with knives that connie does, probably never will.)
one weapon is easily replaced with another, her stun baton swinging up, finding somewhere calculated to connect so that she sees the electricity cause spasms through connie's body, slowing her down long enough for carolina to put a boot to her chest, kicking her back, and- ]
Fuck.
[ the memory cuts off abruptly, in the middle of a motion, when carolina realizes far too late that she's fucking sharing it, like that's something wash ever needed to see, like that's not adding insult to injury because she couldn't bring connie home.
when carolina jerks back, out of reach of wash's touch, it's complete, backing up far enough that she hits the wall behind her in the process. ]
Wash, I'm so- [ she doesn't have a word to go there, just a frustrated sob of a sound. ]
[ Carolina settles a cold hand in his and Wash feels her emotions settle against his in a similar fashion -- unpleasant but expected. Enough like what he's feeling that instead of setting him off worse he just feels like they understand each other, and she gets back an echo of the same frustration and anger tinged with a sense of loss, as Wash starts cleaning her knuckles.
It's not until he's going for the gauze again to wrap one of the deeper scratches that's still bleeding that the memory Carolina is so focused on comes through. He goes still as a statue, having never experienced this before. It's different from the empathy bond, that he's so used to, more immersive and terrifying for that. Perhaps his burst of startled fear is what tips Carolina off, but by then his grip on her hand has tightened to the point she'll have to actively yank away.
Because this is something Wash actually wants to see, in a morbid, grief-soaked way.
He never really knew how it went down, with Connie. And he'd told himself it didn't matter, but he'd then gone on to imagine it, and his imagination tended to be worse than the reality. But Carolina pulls away from him when she realizes, leaving him shaken and unsteady with both hands still out in midair, blinking in horrified, desperate fascination.
She's going to cry, and what's the worst part of this is he doesn't think to comfort her first, he has to check himself from lashing out that she cut off the memory. He needs to see it.
"We don't need you, just your armor," fuck is right. How bad did it get? How much did she suffer? Who landed the final blow? ]
Don't-- please. [ He chokes it out, inarticulately, his voice strained and shaken. ] I need to see the rest.
[ he says he needs to see the rest and she believes that, knows she'd probably beg the same if it was maine or york or north's death she had started to watch. it was either see it through or know nothing at all.
carolina understands and she still has one selfish second where she almost refuses.
but it's wash and she can't do that to him and nothing's going to help right now anyway, so she just makes herself take a deep breath before she steps close again, grabbing his hands in both of her own, gripping so tightly that it hurts.
it's a few overwhelmingly painful seconds of having her eyes closed before she manages to more or less sort out where in the memory she was. a few seconds down the line, maybe, but nothing major has changed. she's still not fighting with anything but her stun baton.
and knives may be connie's specialty, but carolina's specialty is fighting close and she's always prided herself on being able to fight anyone to a standstill. that's the plan. wear connie down until she's out of weapons and surrenders.
(the mother of invention has a brig. she'll make sure the director keeps connie there instead of trying to turn her over to anybody else. she'll come around.)
carolina knocks her teammate back but connie recovers quickly, feinting with her decoy quick enough to catch caroling off guard with a kick to the chest, sending her stumbling back a few paces. even now, reaching back to this decade old memory, she feels the air leave her lungs.
up until this point, she hasn't really given a shit about what the other soldiers in the room are doing. tex and the leader are fighting, if she lucks out, they'll kill one another. she's clearly not that lucky, because the next parries she exchanges with connie happen as the two fights try to get out of the other's way, too close for two fights this out of control to safely happen.
(and if tex is so goddamn perfect, why isn't connie's accomplice dead yet?)
the leader gets too close behind her while connie is catching her balance and she's quick to kick him back towards tex. she hears him hit the ground hard but connie is lunging at her again and carolina's back to trying to wear her down. there's a little superficial damage to the underarmour on her forearms, but connie hasn't scored a real hit yet. carolina has kept the electric current to her weapon off for what feels like forever now.
she's not fighting to kill. she's barely fighting to injure. she should be good enough to pull this off.
a glance to check in on tex's position distracts carolina long enough that it's easier to jump out of the way of the next swipe of connie's blade and carolina takes advantage of that, kicking the knife from her teammate's hand. it hits the ceiling - sticks or bounces, unsure, doesn't matter - and carolina hits the ground at a perfect angle to roll into sweep connie off her feet with another well placed kick.
tex sweeps in while carolina gets back to her feet, picking up the tomahawk she'd had embedded in her chestplate in the first portion of the memory and swinging it too high to actually catch connie - and please, connie's centre of gravity is low already, she keeps it even lower when she's dodging, that just means that tex doesn't know how connie fights. means tex shouldn't be here.
connie activates her decoy again and there's a moment the room is almost still. carolina thinks so, at least, because she sees tex look to the second tomahawk, the one carolina had dodged earlier and carolina knows she's going for it before tex can even move.
and then the fight, the mission, matter a lot less than the fact that the reason her two best teammates are damaged now has two lethal weapons she's about to swing at a friend. fuck the mission. carolina lunges for tex and misses her as the ai steps forward, swinging the weapons low.
one of the connies fizzles out. the other staggers back, a tomahawk lodged in her side.
tex grabs the second tomahawk and throws it with enough force that it knocks connie back into the wall as it embeds in her chestplate.
there's a rise in carolina's panic-laced grief here, that seems to mirror her response in the memory. up until now, her hud has been a useless bit of extra information, always in her periphery but clearly unimportant. now it lights up as she activates it, trying to sync to connie's armour, trying to read her vital signs. there's a whole list of two-letter call signs to choose from (and TX doesn't read anything, never will read anything) but no CT. nobody else's status matters right now because she needs to know how bad connie's condition is. she needs to know how to help.
even as she tries to resync, she steps up behind tex, grabbing her shoulder, only to be immediately brushed off.
"What the hell are you doing?"
her voice pitches high, the tone a familiar one for wash, even if he never would have heard it back then. he hears it now.
"Completing our objective."
"By killing a teammate?"
(she's trying her hud again. why can't she just fucking see how bad it is?)
"She's not a teammate, she's a traitor."
and god, so focused on being pissed off with one another, neither of them have noticed that their enemies have gotten to their feet- the leader supporting connie, helping her to the facility's clearly marked escape pod. the door closes automatically behind them as carolina takes a few furious, futile steps forward.
"Damnit! That's on you." tex waves a hand in carolina's face, as if scolding her. "I guess you can explain how we lost a full suit of armour and failed to capture the leader of the resistance."
the clarity of the memory wavers, tex making a call for extraction as carolina takes a step back, trying to check on her team again, wanting some stupid proof that those injuries weren't as lethal as they look. she sorts her team by proximity and TX lists first without any vitals attached. NY shows next. of course he isn't far away. she sorts alphabetically and- florida's okay, apparently. it's not a surprise. it doesn't really matter right now, because that's not how her team should sort.
background noise in the memory fades away as carolina loses track of what happens next, when it's all just noise and anger and tex winning again, killing a friend in the process. carolina gives up trying to hold it and lets go of wash's hands again as she steps back, her shoulders trembling. one aching hand comes up to press against her mouth, but it doesn't really muffle the sound of her crying. not much could. ]
[ By the time it's over and Carolina is pulling away from him, Wash is pale and nauseated. Because that must have hurt, even if it was over for her fast, and he wants to be angry at Tex. He does. It would be easier to blame her for going for the kill than to break down what actually happened, who's actually responsible. The goddamn fucking Project, the Director and the Counselor and their games. Blame the right people, Wash tells himself, but it's hard when he just watched Tex kill his friend.
He breathes slow, leaning back against and gripping the edge of the sink. He understands how Sharkface feels anew in this moment, how hard it is to sort out who to be angry at especially when you're grieving. Wash never really got over Connie. Never really got over any of them. Still dreams of finding their armor. Dreams of being caught in the tow cable that dragged the Meta to his death, of drowning beside Maine. Relieves Epsilon shattering to pieces inside him, and imagines what it was like for the AI to do it again by choice to save the Reds and Blues. So much pain and suffering, with such a broad spread, that it feels like they'll never make up for, never be done with. That keeps coming back to haunt them one way or another. That still hurts no matter how he's tried to shut down or heal or -- it'll never really go away. So yes. He understands Sharkface. And Carolina, who he's left to cry alone against the bathroom wall while he sorts through the grief and anger.
That's not okay, he thinks. She might be the only one he can actually do something for. ]
H-hey. Carolina.
[ This might make it worse, honestly. Start off some kind of a feedback loop of pain and misery, but it's the only thing he can think to do. He can't leave her alone like this.
Still gripping the sink with one hand, Wash lifts his other, stretching his arm out invitingly. She can choose whether she wants the hug or not, whether she can handle contact. Maybe he should try to think of things besides the memory so they feel better, but the angry part of him that's been there since he was a child wants to sink down into the pain until he's tired of it and can turn it into something useful. Another part, the guilty part, wants to dig his heels in until he hurts enough. It's the third that desperately wants Carolina not to suffer, and he doesn't know which part will win out. He doesn't know for sure yet what's going to happen or what Carolina wants, but this is all he can offer. She can take the risk or not. ]
It wasn't your fault.
[ He should clarify that much, at least, so that if she accepts the contact and feels his rage knows it isn't directed at her. ]
[ this would be easier if she was alone, carolina thinks. she truly, genuinely hates crying and crying like this isn't something she wants to share with anyone. she'll share so much with wash but how is she supposed to come back from this? how is she supposed to have a conversation when she's just showed him that, when she's sobbing so hard that her legs threaten to give out under her as she leans a little harder into the wall?
she's cried like this in front of someone else exactly once in at least twenty years. early in their first visit to chorus, epsilon in her head, palpably torn between straight up leaving until she got it out of her system and some awkward, unsteady, "how the fuck am I supposed to help?" in the end, he had stayed, let her cry herself out. asked her to please never do that again and complained about her being a mess when she finally caught her breath, even as he filled her head with warm affection.
wash isn't any less important or safe to her than epsilon was, but she still hates this.
so she can't go to him just yet, looking at him with tear-filled eyes before it's too much and "it wasn't your fault" feels like the cruelest lie. of course connie's death is her fault. all of their deaths are.
she manages to stumble a few steps over to sit on the closed toilet seat instead of outright sinking to the floor and drops her head into her hands as her elbows dig into her knees. her hands straight up hurt now and she's been clenching them so tightly that the worst of the jagged scrapes on her knuckles has the odd trickle of blood slipping over the back of her hand, down her wrist to soak into the sleeve of her sweater. she'll clean it later. right now, the pain is of some twisted benefit to her now and she uses it to anchor herself as she draws deep, shuddering breaths. tries to stop crying. tries to feel less guilty and angry and broken about the whole thing.
eventually, she calms down enough to try speaking, but she's still not really calm, anxiety still crushing her chest and anger still heating her face. ]
I wanted her to come home.
[ in all fairness, she knows connie probably didn't think of the mother of invention as home. a comfortable enough ship to be stationed on, full of people she might have trusted at one far-removed time but not anymore. it was home for carolina, more than the quiet house on earth ever was, because it's where her family was. where she'd felt the safest, right up until the end.
when carolina says home, she just means wherever her people are.
she lifts her head slightly, glancing up at wash and breathing out a quiet, ] I tried.
[ Wash doesn't push the issue. Carolina doesn't come to him, she sits down instead and he drops his arm, lets go of the sink... and gives in to the weak sick feeling to sit against the wall across from her, knees bent up. Their boots are touching, but there's no bond. He lets Carolina cry herself out, feeing helpless and tired, his own eyes burning. But if he cried himself it'd be angry, and he doesn't want to be angry anymore. It's so tempting to wrap himself up in it like a blanket, but. They've seen what that does. Both to him and to Sharkface, to Carolina herself.
He sits quietly, head tilted back to watch her, stomaching twisting. Finally, she speaks. Looks up at him a little and is just so sad, Wash almost can't take it. But he stays with her. ]
[ carolina nods, then drops her head again, not wanting to watch wash for too long. not when she's trying to compose herself, when now she's terrified of sharing what's happened to him. she had known about the memory sharing aspect of the new abilities that came with being displaced, but she hadn't thought much of it, hadn't thought to ask anybody how exactly it worked. wash is the only person she ever really touches anyway and he keeps her feeling so even-keeled that she's gotten less concerned with hiding feelings from him. even when he gets a flicker of something that might be damning, it's hardly as if his injury is the only thing she has to feel guilty about.
it's clearly mistaken now, but she thought she had to want to share memories. not just be stuck in her head and trying to let someone help her. carolina thinks she can avoid this in the future, probably - keep it tucked away in key moments the way she'd kept memories tucked away from her ai, when she'd had them. keeping things from epsilon had been futile sometimes and he still poked around wherever he wanted to, digging out snippets to fill in the blanks he got from the director's memories, but with the twins, it had worked. she'd hidden her least rational fears from eta, hidden the way york made her feel once upon a time from iota.
she can do this.
tugging her sleeves down over her palms, she takes a deep breath and starts trying to wipe her face off, adding to the mess around the wrists and ensuring that she definitely needs to do laundry before the day is up. it's a later problem. right now, it takes a while before she finds her voice again. ]
Before Tex engaged her, Connie was talking about how we'd all be paying for what the Director did by the end of the Project. How we already were. I feel like I've been trying to fix everything he broke forever and it'll never stop, I'll never catch up. Like I'm going to be trying to atone for Project Freelancer until it kills me.
[ carolina draws another shaky breath and looks up again, seeking wash's gaze. her face is splotchy, expression anguished, but she's gotten herself back under control. ]
[ There's a long moment where Wash just meets her eyes quietly, not knowing what to say or do. He's tired of it, too, but mostly for Carolina's sake -- he can and should blame himself for things but feels like she's really gotten the brunt of it all and it's not fair. It's not. He's so sorry for it, but he can't fix it for her and that guts him. As always, Carolina is the one protecting him. Can't it be the other way around, just once?
He sighs, then leans forward and reaches up to grab the icepack off the edge of the sink and gives it a twist and shake to activate the cold. If she's not going to let him clean her other hand yet she can at least keep the swelling down. Even with her sleeves pulled down Wash can tell her knuckles are puffy and bruising. ]
I feel the same way. [ he finally says, trying to put it into words, ] But you seem to get blamed more than I do. Maybe because you were the leader, maybe because you were the best of us, I don't... I don't know, honestly. But I'm not going to let atonement kill you. Or let you kill yourself trying to atone.
We've left each other alone before, it didn't end well either time. I'm not leaving you ever again.
[ when her eyes fill with tears again, at least it's for a different reason. it had taken carolina so long to see him fully as her equal and then he turns around and... he's her best friend, knows her better than anyone else ever has. and still says shit like that to her. still wants to stay with her.
she's missed him being himself and she loves him so much and she doesn't mind that she has to duck her head to wipe her face off another time, sniffling a little behind her hands as she pulls herself back together. she'll sort words out in a minute, once she's stopped crying again, because this is embarrassing as hell. it's a long, painful few seconds, but eventually she manages and sits upright to take a deep breath, pushing the sleeves of her sweater up to her elbows, baring her forearms and the mess that is the back of her hands.
reaching out to brush her fingertips across the back of one of his hands is her way of accepting help from him now and serves the bonus purpose of sharing just how much she appreciates him. she's so bad at words but for all the grief and pain and exhaustion simmering beneath the surface, the most obvious thing she shares with him is affection: warm, protective love. ]
I'm not leaving you, either.
[ because she has to keep looking out for him, yes, but also because she needs him far more than she'll ever be capable of admitting. ]
[ Wash doesn't say anything when Carolina starts crying again, just lets her keep control of her hands for a few moments longer so she can compose herself and wipe at her face. When she finally reaches out for him he holds still, braced for at least a little misery but surprisingly there isn't much. What's there blends with his own enough he can push it to the background and just focus on what she's trying to share -- something warm and appreciative and loving, that Wash isn't entirely certain he deserves but is incredibly grateful to have.
He turns his hand to hold hers gently, settling the icepack over her knuckles and maintaining the bond, sending his own love back as best he can. It's okay that there's other stuff in the background, he thinks. Like stones affecting the flow of a stream, things are never going to be perfectly smooth. But they have each other. ]
I'm sorry today was hard. But I really am glad you're here with me now.
[ curling her fingers around his, carolina finally touches something without gripping hard enough to cause her more of an ache in her hands. she's letting him help, sinking into the love he gives back to her. sharing that feels a hell of a lot more healthy than all the anger and the memory she hadn't meant to share before. relatively, at least. calling either one of them mentally healthy would be a joke.
she gives a little nod, agreeing as she keeps her eyes on his face. ]
[ He shifts, setting her hand down on her own knee and reaching for the other, drawing it over so she's holding the pack on the knuckles he's already cleaned. ]
Keep that there, I'll get your other hand. This one's probably going to sting.
[ A little more reaching and Wash winds up kneeling in front of her where she sits, pouring peroxide onto the gauze and dabbing at the scrapes far more carefully than he probably needs to. Far more gently. Only a few tiny beads of blood well up under his attentions, but he still wants to wrap the deeper cuts. To protect her other clothes if nothing else, it's not like they have expansive wardrobes here. ]
[ outside of another little nod, carolina doesn't really move, letting wash lead this little moment. letting him help. it's a hard thing to do, but if anyone has stuck around enough bullshit to be able to help, it's him. he can reposition her hands, take his time. there's no rush.
but there is the odd bit of contact between them as he works and any of carolina's feelings wash picks up are steady. warmth, gratitude, far more vibrant than every tired, worn emotion underneath, even if they're always present somewhere.
when he's finished whatever bandaging he wants to do - she doesn't think it's necessary, but she holds her tongue, this time - carolina raises a hand to cup his cheek. her fingers are cold from holding the icepack so the touch is almost certainly some sort of unpleasant, but... well, she's trying. ]
Thank you.
[ for so much more than just helping clean her up, but she won't specify out loud. the emotional bond between them probably expresses enough. ]
[ Wash finishes patching Carolina up, switching the arrangements of hands and icepack halfway through to put a few bandages on the other side. When he finally tosses away the used gauze and is about to get up, though, Carolina reaches out and cups his cheek with an icy hand.
He doesn't flinch, just looks up at her to see what she wants, but what she says is exactly what he feels coming across the bond. Gratitude. For more than just her knuckles.
The moment lingers and slowly, Wash kneels up to bring them closer, not dislodging the hand on his cheek until he reaches out to pull her into a hug. She'll have to lean over slightly, but he honestly didn't think about standing and tugging her up after him. He's feeling a little wrung out from all of this -- the bond can take it out of him at the best of times but right now it's a good thing. Comforting.
What he says next, however, might throw her for a bit of a loop. ]
[ when he hugs her, carolina slouches into it easily, her hand slipping from his cheek to the back of his head, the other finding a place on his back. not great for her posture but good for her heart, right about now. the empathetic bond is an unwanted, messed up thing but they've found a way to make the best of it. to make it good for them.
and then wash talks and carolina's mind goes to the absolute worst place first, because it really wasn't that long ago that she watched an actor pretending to be wash say almost the exact same thing and have it mean something completely different than it should. there's a hitch in her breath and because she chooses not to jerk away (this time, like she's done so much in the past when things have gotten unpleasant between them) wash has a front row seat to the rush of sequential emotions that creates.
panic kicks in fast, but it's one of those emotions in carolina that's always ready. but the anxiety is different than usual, it's flustered, because she remembers how she felt on that beach for real. missing york and hating herself for the choices she made, not sure at all that carrying his lighter around with her actually helped anything. and wash was there, dragging her out of her head, letting her feel that bittersweet ache, giving her permission to keep something she could have let go of.
she'd been close to wash for quite some time, but that moment, with him holding her hand, had felt like a different kind of close. taking off her armour to figure out just what kind of close they could be seemed like a possibility she should consider. a real option, whatever wash was offering her.
except he was just offering her a way of speeding up their problem solving and dear god she's an idiot.
if wash has ever wondered what carolina full on mortified would feel or sound like, it's this, complete with an almost pained little noise at just how stupid she feels. ]
Good call.
[ because the sleeves of it are disgusting and carolina knows this but there's still reluctance in the way she pulls back now, letting go of him so she can unzip the garment and start to pull it off. ]
[ Wash really just meant it so they could soak her cuffs and get it in the laundry before anything stained but the rush of emotions he gets from Carolina are confusing and -- oh. ]
Oh god. I'm sorry, did you think I meant--
[ His eyes go wide and he blushes under his freckles, standing up with a deer in headlights expression. ]
I-- would you ever--
[ Would she have wanted that? Because. That sure was a moment, but Wash isn't sure he even know how to be with someone anymore. If he ever did. ]
[ she's grasping at words here, at some reasonable, diplomatic way of explaining herself and "a guy we know made us a thing in the movie he's making" would lead to so many more questions than answers, so she can't even try to blame jax. still kind of blames him, sure, but also has to blame wash for being so endearingly good to her. blames that more than anything else.
stupid wash, being good for her. ]
I mean, I wouldn't... [ hate the idea.
but that could put him on the spot, risk their friendship and the way they are here and she can't afford to lose him. pulling the sweatshirt off, she bundles it against her chest like a security blanket, clenched in her hands, and glances toward the door. she could just leave, maybe. ]
Can we just- Wash, I-
[ her face was already red from crying, so maybe he won't notice how hard she's blushing, too. god, she misses her helmet. ]
[ It's the aborted 'I wouldn't' that he finishes in his mind as 'wouldn't want that' and the frantic way Carolina glances at the door that have Wash looking a little ashamed of himself now. ]
Yeah, of course. Here, I'll put it in the washer.
[ He holds out a hand for the sweatshirt, still blushing. He can let her have some space and take care of this for her and they'll be back to normal by dinner. It's fine. This is fine. ]
[ she almost hands over the sweatshirt automatically. wash is helping. she's letting him help.
but then she worries that this is going to make things too difficult for them and she just. curls her fingers a little tighter in the fabric. takes a deep breath. asks a question that she probably shouldn't. ]
[ 'Not if you don't' is a cop out answer and Wash knows it, but by virtue of that being the only thing he can think to say in this moment kind of means he would, right? Or might? ]
Maybe? It doesn't matter, right?
[ Because she wouldn't. And god knows he's capable of repression. ]
[ her gaze goes to the door again and she really should just bury this conversation here but nothing is that easy for her. not emotions, not being stuck in her own head, not her best friend. bright green eyes settle on wash's face again as she exhales, leans a little closer to him. ]
[ Carolina looks to the door again and Wash is a split second from just grabbing the sweatshirt and bolting, but then she moves a little closer, and her expression isn't disgusted or incredulous. She isn't laughing. She isn't acting like how someone who isn't interested at all would be acting, and nerves start fluttering in Wash's stomach.
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[ Except Wash is pretty sure the only reason he was able to be talked down, convinced to see reason, was that he murdered Angela. And that's on them. But Wash isn't going to dump that on Carolina right now, even if she'll feel his guilt when she takes his hand. It could be from any number of things. Whatever. He keeps his hand out, waiting patiently, the frustration and disappointment that he'd locked down when in front of Sharkface creeping back now that it's just them. ]
We hoped for too much too fast.
[ He says it again to Carolina, trying to sound reasonable rather than bitter. Objectively, things like forgiveness take time, sometimes it never happens. This might be one of those things. He just hates that it feels like the blame, the punishment, is never going to end. ]
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[ she's agreeing for his sake, because it sounds reasonable and rational and she needs to pretend she's a reasonable person until she actually can be again.
we hoped for too much. what had carolina even hoped for, really? a civil conversation? some conclusion that he could hate their guts and still be capable of ignoring it? it hadn't felt like too much. but it's still unsatisfying and just how easily she can see the disappointment in wash's face doesn't help.
like not being able to fix this has let him down again. like it's dumb luck and people who are practically strangers to thank for him not being hurt again at the hands of someone fucked over by project freelancer. like every time she thinks she has all of the director's bullshit patched up and dealt with, it comes back.
he's still breaking her family from beyond the grave. she's still paying for his crimes.
(and god, connie really did have the whole thing figured out, if only anyone could have talked to her.)
she lets her eyes close, takes a deep breath. ]
I'm sorry he found out who you were.
[ she's sorry for a lot of things, but she can voice that safely, at least. ]
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[ His jaw works, gaze on Carolina's hands where they're gripping the sink. There's blood seeping from her knuckles to stain the porcelain, and Wash softens his voice a little. ]
Let me patch you up.
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[ other things might, when they're in a better place, when they banter, but not that. friendships can form fast and wash is nothing if not endearing.
which means she can't keep him at arm's length indefinitely, carolina taking a few more seconds to decide what's safe to think about - anger is easy, so's frustration, but she can keep the guilt away the way she used to keep her anxiety away from eta and iota. it's not there, not for them.
anything but temple, she tells herself, and finally lifts a hand to put it in his- cold to the touch and still dripping with water, but at least she's touching him.
except anything but temple drags her mind to a different memory and for the moment, it's too vivid to ignore.
a dark room, connie and a soldier opposite her, her pistol up. helmet tilted just enough that she can see tex out of the corner of her eye, because she doesn't trust the other agent. how could she possibly trust her, when she's such a large part of the reason york and maine are both hurt? when tex means the director tells carolina less than ever before?
"- And I won't take orders from a shadow."
"What did you just call me?"
she needs to stop this, deescalate. carolina tries to talk over tex: "You're coming with us, CT. This is your last chance."
"No, I'm not going anywhere with you."
"Actually, we don't need you. We just need your armour."
tex fires the first shot and, uncharacteristically, carolina freezes, rooted to the spot with an anguish she could never even begin to articulate. this isn't how this was supposed to go. they were supposed to talk, connie was supposed to agree to come back to the mother of invention, spitting mad but home. connie not coming back in more or less one piece isn't supposed to be an option.
the other three all move, though. connie's gotten so good at using her decoy and carolina almost wants to be proud, half rooting for her when she twists one of tex's arms behind her back and carolina can hear one of her knives sink into places knives aren't meant to go.
by the time tex hits the ground hard (no one's lucky enough for that to kill her, it just slows her for a moment) carolina isn't frozen anymore, darting out of the way of something sharp and weighted thrown at her before connie's there, slashing, driving carolina back a few steps before connie's blade tears the pistol from carolina's hand, sending it far out of reach.
(impressive, carolina wants to tell her, like this is just a training match where they've done that move a hundred times before. she doesn't have the skill with knives that connie does, probably never will.)
one weapon is easily replaced with another, her stun baton swinging up, finding somewhere calculated to connect so that she sees the electricity cause spasms through connie's body, slowing her down long enough for carolina to put a boot to her chest, kicking her back, and- ]
Fuck.
[ the memory cuts off abruptly, in the middle of a motion, when carolina realizes far too late that she's fucking sharing it, like that's something wash ever needed to see, like that's not adding insult to injury because she couldn't bring connie home.
when carolina jerks back, out of reach of wash's touch, it's complete, backing up far enough that she hits the wall behind her in the process. ]
Wash, I'm so- [ she doesn't have a word to go there, just a frustrated sob of a sound. ]
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It's not until he's going for the gauze again to wrap one of the deeper scratches that's still bleeding that the memory Carolina is so focused on comes through. He goes still as a statue, having never experienced this before. It's different from the empathy bond, that he's so used to, more immersive and terrifying for that. Perhaps his burst of startled fear is what tips Carolina off, but by then his grip on her hand has tightened to the point she'll have to actively yank away.
Because this is something Wash actually wants to see, in a morbid, grief-soaked way.
He never really knew how it went down, with Connie. And he'd told himself it didn't matter, but he'd then gone on to imagine it, and his imagination tended to be worse than the reality. But Carolina pulls away from him when she realizes, leaving him shaken and unsteady with both hands still out in midair, blinking in horrified, desperate fascination.
She's going to cry, and what's the worst part of this is he doesn't think to comfort her first, he has to check himself from lashing out that she cut off the memory. He needs to see it.
"We don't need you, just your armor," fuck is right. How bad did it get? How much did she suffer? Who landed the final blow? ]
Don't-- please. [ He chokes it out, inarticulately, his voice strained and shaken. ] I need to see the rest.
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carolina understands and she still has one selfish second where she almost refuses.
but it's wash and she can't do that to him and nothing's going to help right now anyway, so she just makes herself take a deep breath before she steps close again, grabbing his hands in both of her own, gripping so tightly that it hurts.
it's a few overwhelmingly painful seconds of having her eyes closed before she manages to more or less sort out where in the memory she was. a few seconds down the line, maybe, but nothing major has changed. she's still not fighting with anything but her stun baton.
and knives may be connie's specialty, but carolina's specialty is fighting close and she's always prided herself on being able to fight anyone to a standstill. that's the plan. wear connie down until she's out of weapons and surrenders.
(the mother of invention has a brig. she'll make sure the director keeps connie there instead of trying to turn her over to anybody else. she'll come around.)
carolina knocks her teammate back but connie recovers quickly, feinting with her decoy quick enough to catch caroling off guard with a kick to the chest, sending her stumbling back a few paces. even now, reaching back to this decade old memory, she feels the air leave her lungs.
up until this point, she hasn't really given a shit about what the other soldiers in the room are doing. tex and the leader are fighting, if she lucks out, they'll kill one another. she's clearly not that lucky, because the next parries she exchanges with connie happen as the two fights try to get out of the other's way, too close for two fights this out of control to safely happen.
(and if tex is so goddamn perfect, why isn't connie's accomplice dead yet?)
the leader gets too close behind her while connie is catching her balance and she's quick to kick him back towards tex. she hears him hit the ground hard but connie is lunging at her again and carolina's back to trying to wear her down. there's a little superficial damage to the underarmour on her forearms, but connie hasn't scored a real hit yet. carolina has kept the electric current to her weapon off for what feels like forever now.
she's not fighting to kill. she's barely fighting to injure. she should be good enough to pull this off.
a glance to check in on tex's position distracts carolina long enough that it's easier to jump out of the way of the next swipe of connie's blade and carolina takes advantage of that, kicking the knife from her teammate's hand. it hits the ceiling - sticks or bounces, unsure, doesn't matter - and carolina hits the ground at a perfect angle to roll into sweep connie off her feet with another well placed kick.
tex sweeps in while carolina gets back to her feet, picking up the tomahawk she'd had embedded in her chestplate in the first portion of the memory and swinging it too high to actually catch connie - and please, connie's centre of gravity is low already, she keeps it even lower when she's dodging, that just means that tex doesn't know how connie fights. means tex shouldn't be here.
connie activates her decoy again and there's a moment the room is almost still. carolina thinks so, at least, because she sees tex look to the second tomahawk, the one carolina had dodged earlier and carolina knows she's going for it before tex can even move.
and then the fight, the mission, matter a lot less than the fact that the reason her two best teammates are damaged now has two lethal weapons she's about to swing at a friend. fuck the mission. carolina lunges for tex and misses her as the ai steps forward, swinging the weapons low.
one of the connies fizzles out. the other staggers back, a tomahawk lodged in her side.
tex grabs the second tomahawk and throws it with enough force that it knocks connie back into the wall as it embeds in her chestplate.
there's a rise in carolina's panic-laced grief here, that seems to mirror her response in the memory. up until now, her hud has been a useless bit of extra information, always in her periphery but clearly unimportant. now it lights up as she activates it, trying to sync to connie's armour, trying to read her vital signs. there's a whole list of two-letter call signs to choose from (and TX doesn't read anything, never will read anything) but no CT. nobody else's status matters right now because she needs to know how bad connie's condition is. she needs to know how to help.
even as she tries to resync, she steps up behind tex, grabbing her shoulder, only to be immediately brushed off.
"What the hell are you doing?"
her voice pitches high, the tone a familiar one for wash, even if he never would have heard it back then. he hears it now.
"Completing our objective."
"By killing a teammate?"
(she's trying her hud again. why can't she just fucking see how bad it is?)
"She's not a teammate, she's a traitor."
and god, so focused on being pissed off with one another, neither of them have noticed that their enemies have gotten to their feet- the leader supporting connie, helping her to the facility's clearly marked escape pod. the door closes automatically behind them as carolina takes a few furious, futile steps forward.
"Damnit! That's on you." tex waves a hand in carolina's face, as if scolding her. "I guess you can explain how we lost a full suit of armour and failed to capture the leader of the resistance."
the clarity of the memory wavers, tex making a call for extraction as carolina takes a step back, trying to check on her team again, wanting some stupid proof that those injuries weren't as lethal as they look. she sorts her team by proximity and TX lists first without any vitals attached. NY shows next. of course he isn't far away. she sorts alphabetically and- florida's okay, apparently. it's not a surprise. it doesn't really matter right now, because that's not how her team should sort.
background noise in the memory fades away as carolina loses track of what happens next, when it's all just noise and anger and tex winning again, killing a friend in the process. carolina gives up trying to hold it and lets go of wash's hands again as she steps back, her shoulders trembling. one aching hand comes up to press against her mouth, but it doesn't really muffle the sound of her crying. not much could. ]
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He breathes slow, leaning back against and gripping the edge of the sink. He understands how Sharkface feels anew in this moment, how hard it is to sort out who to be angry at especially when you're grieving. Wash never really got over Connie. Never really got over any of them. Still dreams of finding their armor. Dreams of being caught in the tow cable that dragged the Meta to his death, of drowning beside Maine. Relieves Epsilon shattering to pieces inside him, and imagines what it was like for the AI to do it again by choice to save the Reds and Blues. So much pain and suffering, with such a broad spread, that it feels like they'll never make up for, never be done with. That keeps coming back to haunt them one way or another. That still hurts no matter how he's tried to shut down or heal or -- it'll never really go away. So yes. He understands Sharkface. And Carolina, who he's left to cry alone against the bathroom wall while he sorts through the grief and anger.
That's not okay, he thinks. She might be the only one he can actually do something for. ]
H-hey. Carolina.
[ This might make it worse, honestly. Start off some kind of a feedback loop of pain and misery, but it's the only thing he can think to do. He can't leave her alone like this.
Still gripping the sink with one hand, Wash lifts his other, stretching his arm out invitingly. She can choose whether she wants the hug or not, whether she can handle contact. Maybe he should try to think of things besides the memory so they feel better, but the angry part of him that's been there since he was a child wants to sink down into the pain until he's tired of it and can turn it into something useful. Another part, the guilty part, wants to dig his heels in until he hurts enough. It's the third that desperately wants Carolina not to suffer, and he doesn't know which part will win out. He doesn't know for sure yet what's going to happen or what Carolina wants, but this is all he can offer. She can take the risk or not. ]
It wasn't your fault.
[ He should clarify that much, at least, so that if she accepts the contact and feels his rage knows it isn't directed at her. ]
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she's cried like this in front of someone else exactly once in at least twenty years. early in their first visit to chorus, epsilon in her head, palpably torn between straight up leaving until she got it out of her system and some awkward, unsteady, "how the fuck am I supposed to help?" in the end, he had stayed, let her cry herself out. asked her to please never do that again and complained about her being a mess when she finally caught her breath, even as he filled her head with warm affection.
wash isn't any less important or safe to her than epsilon was, but she still hates this.
so she can't go to him just yet, looking at him with tear-filled eyes before it's too much and "it wasn't your fault" feels like the cruelest lie. of course connie's death is her fault. all of their deaths are.
she manages to stumble a few steps over to sit on the closed toilet seat instead of outright sinking to the floor and drops her head into her hands as her elbows dig into her knees. her hands straight up hurt now and she's been clenching them so tightly that the worst of the jagged scrapes on her knuckles has the odd trickle of blood slipping over the back of her hand, down her wrist to soak into the sleeve of her sweater. she'll clean it later. right now, the pain is of some twisted benefit to her now and she uses it to anchor herself as she draws deep, shuddering breaths. tries to stop crying. tries to feel less guilty and angry and broken about the whole thing.
eventually, she calms down enough to try speaking, but she's still not really calm, anxiety still crushing her chest and anger still heating her face. ]
I wanted her to come home.
[ in all fairness, she knows connie probably didn't think of the mother of invention as home. a comfortable enough ship to be stationed on, full of people she might have trusted at one far-removed time but not anymore. it was home for carolina, more than the quiet house on earth ever was, because it's where her family was. where she'd felt the safest, right up until the end.
when carolina says home, she just means wherever her people are.
she lifts her head slightly, glancing up at wash and breathing out a quiet, ] I tried.
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He sits quietly, head tilted back to watch her, stomaching twisting. Finally, she speaks. Looks up at him a little and is just so sad, Wash almost can't take it. But he stays with her. ]
...I know now.
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it's clearly mistaken now, but she thought she had to want to share memories. not just be stuck in her head and trying to let someone help her. carolina thinks she can avoid this in the future, probably - keep it tucked away in key moments the way she'd kept memories tucked away from her ai, when she'd had them. keeping things from epsilon had been futile sometimes and he still poked around wherever he wanted to, digging out snippets to fill in the blanks he got from the director's memories, but with the twins, it had worked. she'd hidden her least rational fears from eta, hidden the way york made her feel once upon a time from iota.
she can do this.
tugging her sleeves down over her palms, she takes a deep breath and starts trying to wipe her face off, adding to the mess around the wrists and ensuring that she definitely needs to do laundry before the day is up. it's a later problem. right now, it takes a while before she finds her voice again. ]
Before Tex engaged her, Connie was talking about how we'd all be paying for what the Director did by the end of the Project. How we already were. I feel like I've been trying to fix everything he broke forever and it'll never stop, I'll never catch up. Like I'm going to be trying to atone for Project Freelancer until it kills me.
[ carolina draws another shaky breath and looks up again, seeking wash's gaze. her face is splotchy, expression anguished, but she's gotten herself back under control. ]
David... I'm so tired of it.
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He sighs, then leans forward and reaches up to grab the icepack off the edge of the sink and gives it a twist and shake to activate the cold. If she's not going to let him clean her other hand yet she can at least keep the swelling down. Even with her sleeves pulled down Wash can tell her knuckles are puffy and bruising. ]
I feel the same way. [ he finally says, trying to put it into words, ] But you seem to get blamed more than I do. Maybe because you were the leader, maybe because you were the best of us, I don't... I don't know, honestly. But I'm not going to let atonement kill you. Or let you kill yourself trying to atone.
We've left each other alone before, it didn't end well either time. I'm not leaving you ever again.
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she's missed him being himself and she loves him so much and she doesn't mind that she has to duck her head to wipe her face off another time, sniffling a little behind her hands as she pulls herself back together. she'll sort words out in a minute, once she's stopped crying again, because this is embarrassing as hell. it's a long, painful few seconds, but eventually she manages and sits upright to take a deep breath, pushing the sleeves of her sweater up to her elbows, baring her forearms and the mess that is the back of her hands.
reaching out to brush her fingertips across the back of one of his hands is her way of accepting help from him now and serves the bonus purpose of sharing just how much she appreciates him. she's so bad at words but for all the grief and pain and exhaustion simmering beneath the surface, the most obvious thing she shares with him is affection: warm, protective love. ]
I'm not leaving you, either.
[ because she has to keep looking out for him, yes, but also because she needs him far more than she'll ever be capable of admitting. ]
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He turns his hand to hold hers gently, settling the icepack over her knuckles and maintaining the bond, sending his own love back as best he can. It's okay that there's other stuff in the background, he thinks. Like stones affecting the flow of a stream, things are never going to be perfectly smooth. But they have each other. ]
I'm sorry today was hard. But I really am glad you're here with me now.
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she gives a little nod, agreeing as she keeps her eyes on his face. ]
Me, too. We'll be okay.
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[ He shifts, setting her hand down on her own knee and reaching for the other, drawing it over so she's holding the pack on the knuckles he's already cleaned. ]
Keep that there, I'll get your other hand. This one's probably going to sting.
[ A little more reaching and Wash winds up kneeling in front of her where she sits, pouring peroxide onto the gauze and dabbing at the scrapes far more carefully than he probably needs to. Far more gently. Only a few tiny beads of blood well up under his attentions, but he still wants to wrap the deeper cuts. To protect her other clothes if nothing else, it's not like they have expansive wardrobes here. ]
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but there is the odd bit of contact between them as he works and any of carolina's feelings wash picks up are steady. warmth, gratitude, far more vibrant than every tired, worn emotion underneath, even if they're always present somewhere.
when he's finished whatever bandaging he wants to do - she doesn't think it's necessary, but she holds her tongue, this time - carolina raises a hand to cup his cheek. her fingers are cold from holding the icepack so the touch is almost certainly some sort of unpleasant, but... well, she's trying. ]
Thank you.
[ for so much more than just helping clean her up, but she won't specify out loud. the emotional bond between them probably expresses enough. ]
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He doesn't flinch, just looks up at her to see what she wants, but what she says is exactly what he feels coming across the bond. Gratitude. For more than just her knuckles.
The moment lingers and slowly, Wash kneels up to bring them closer, not dislodging the hand on his cheek until he reaches out to pull her into a hug. She'll have to lean over slightly, but he honestly didn't think about standing and tugging her up after him. He's feeling a little wrung out from all of this -- the bond can take it out of him at the best of times but right now it's a good thing. Comforting.
What he says next, however, might throw her for a bit of a loop. ]
Take off your sweatshirt.
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and then wash talks and carolina's mind goes to the absolute worst place first, because it really wasn't that long ago that she watched an actor pretending to be wash say almost the exact same thing and have it mean something completely different than it should. there's a hitch in her breath and because she chooses not to jerk away (this time, like she's done so much in the past when things have gotten unpleasant between them) wash has a front row seat to the rush of sequential emotions that creates.
panic kicks in fast, but it's one of those emotions in carolina that's always ready. but the anxiety is different than usual, it's flustered, because she remembers how she felt on that beach for real. missing york and hating herself for the choices she made, not sure at all that carrying his lighter around with her actually helped anything. and wash was there, dragging her out of her head, letting her feel that bittersweet ache, giving her permission to keep something she could have let go of.
she'd been close to wash for quite some time, but that moment, with him holding her hand, had felt like a different kind of close. taking off her armour to figure out just what kind of close they could be seemed like a possibility she should consider. a real option, whatever wash was offering her.
except he was just offering her a way of speeding up their problem solving and dear god she's an idiot.
if wash has ever wondered what carolina full on mortified would feel or sound like, it's this, complete with an almost pained little noise at just how stupid she feels. ]
Good call.
[ because the sleeves of it are disgusting and carolina knows this but there's still reluctance in the way she pulls back now, letting go of him so she can unzip the garment and start to pull it off. ]
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Oh god. I'm sorry, did you think I meant--
[ His eyes go wide and he blushes under his freckles, standing up with a deer in headlights expression. ]
I-- would you ever--
[ Would she have wanted that? Because. That sure was a moment, but Wash isn't sure he even know how to be with someone anymore. If he ever did. ]
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[ she's grasping at words here, at some reasonable, diplomatic way of explaining herself and "a guy we know made us a thing in the movie he's making" would lead to so many more questions than answers, so she can't even try to blame jax. still kind of blames him, sure, but also has to blame wash for being so endearingly good to her. blames that more than anything else.
stupid wash, being good for her. ]
I mean, I wouldn't... [ hate the idea.
but that could put him on the spot, risk their friendship and the way they are here and she can't afford to lose him. pulling the sweatshirt off, she bundles it against her chest like a security blanket, clenched in her hands, and glances toward the door. she could just leave, maybe. ]
Can we just- Wash, I-
[ her face was already red from crying, so maybe he won't notice how hard she's blushing, too. god, she misses her helmet. ]
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Yeah, of course. Here, I'll put it in the washer.
[ He holds out a hand for the sweatshirt, still blushing. He can let her have some space and take care of this for her and they'll be back to normal by dinner. It's fine. This is fine. ]
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but then she worries that this is going to make things too difficult for them and she just. curls her fingers a little tighter in the fabric. takes a deep breath. asks a question that she probably shouldn't. ]
Would you want that?
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[ 'Not if you don't' is a cop out answer and Wash knows it, but by virtue of that being the only thing he can think to say in this moment kind of means he would, right? Or might? ]
Maybe? It doesn't matter, right?
[ Because she wouldn't. And god knows he's capable of repression. ]
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It might matter.
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He doesn't pull back. ]
Depending on what?
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