[Neal's jaw tightens a little at the indirect mention of Shaw, though he has nothing to criticize regarding her approach to Will--she knows the man, and Neal himself has only started to get past his borderline-irrational dislike.]
It's not stupid. Come over and see George. Pet something soft. I'll make tea.
Of course. [And lo, Neal comes to Malcolm's bearing cat (on the end of a leash and harness) and a crisp herbal tea mix with ginger and citrus. He lets himself in, knocking as he enters.]
"I got one with a handle in case there's ever a moment I need to grab him and run. More practical than a collar in that regard."
He unclips the leash to let George roam, comes and sets his tea mix offering on the kitchen island, and hugs Malcolm tight. Shaw's voice whispers at him-- He hurts and alienates people left and right, and you care more about people responding badly and 'shitting on him' than you do about that.
Malcolm all but collapses into that hug. Walls and defenses and masks melting off and landing crumpled on the ground.
"I don't like this," he whispers, and he doesn't mean the hug. "It feels dangerous. Like she could take him away somewhere. I don't like it. I feel like something menacing is creeping up the back of my neck but I can't see what it is."
Neal's lips tighten into a line so thin there's a rim of white around his mouth. It takes him a few seconds to disengage from the fury, to try and peel his own current anger apart from Malcolm's concerns.
"None of your friends or Will's friends would let that happen in any long-term way. If she, as his warden, feels the need to isolate him for a few days based on the incident, she is his warden, and from what I can tell people are matched for good reasons. Even if we can't always tell what they are."
He kisses Malcolm's forehead. "But no one, least of all me, is going to let the two of you be permanently separated because you're fucking upset that your boyfriend felt pushed to kill someone in preemptive self-defense."
Neal's such a calming and commanding presence, he actually has almost stopped vibrating out of his skin.
"This person tortured him and stabbed him before. They stabbed John Doe on the space station. When they said they would do it to him again, he had no reason not to believe them. I'm not saying his response was proportionate; I'm saying it was understandable and he was defending himself. He shouldn't have to wait until the knife is actually in his back to start doing that when the person threatening him definitely means it and has harmed him before."
Malcolm's eyes search Neal's face for his response to that.
"She said telling him he didn't do anything wrong wasn't helping. But that... wasn't exactly what I said but... Avalon was the aggressor, not Will."
Malcolm sees something there that actually distracts him from his myriad problems for a moment.
"Something happened between you and Shaw," he murmurs. It slips out before he can remind himself to rephrase it as a question. Then he catches it and opens his mouth and closes it and stammers "I mean... did something happen? You seem upset."
That at least takes the edge off Neal's anger. Coaxes out a smile. "Nice catch, and tidy redirect. You're getting good at that."
He takes a slow breath and exhales. "Shaw and I had a disagreement. She suggested I couldn't be unbiased when it comes to you, and she's right, but she also discounted my ability to consider anyone's feelings other than yours and then informed me that it wasn't a personal failing, and when I tried to tell her she was wrong, she double or perhaps tripled down. And I hung up on her. We haven't talked since."
Neal blinks at him, baffled. "What? Why are you sorry? There's nothing to do right now, not until I calm down enough that I can think of her hypocrisy and the fact that she's decided she's the only objective individual on board without wanting to break my knuckles against a bulkhead."
Malcolm winces a little. "Yeah... don't... don't do that," he agrees. His fingers linger, fidgeting, at that sleeve. "Maybe... maybe I just need to calm down too. Will says it's not forever. I just... she hasn't said how long. People who get thrown in Zero or have privileges removed or are under cabin arrest or... or have to work in the kitchen to make up for trashing the dining room get told how long that's going to last. What the amount of time is to achieve the objective. The length of their sentence. But she hasn't said how long she's going to follow him everywhere and never leave him alone even with another Warden." His brow creases a little and he looks down at the sleeve. "Well. With me, anyway. I'm a Warden but I'm not allowed to be the one that stays with him even a bit of the time so he doesn't.... I don't even know what. Have another interaction she doesn't control? I don't understand what she's trying to achieve. This is raiding all the inmate cabins on the... her inmate's brain level."
Neal takes another slow breath, freshly irritated, actually using a ten-count to soothe himself before he tries to say anything this time.
"I think it's more that she's in her own information-gathering stage. It looks different than yours with Kikimora, but again, that doesn't mean it's necessarily wrong. She hasn't decided how to proceed and until she has the data she needs, she won't be able to give anyone a definitive timeline. I don't know Will well enough to say, but if this kind of... preemptive self-defense was one of his issues before the Barge, it could be what she's trying to address."
He loosens his hold on Malcolm experimentally to see how the man reacts, and if it's not bad, Neal will start making them both tea. "I also don't think she's worried about your influence on Will as much as she might be concerned about his influence on you. She has minimal respect for you and minimal respect for my estimations of your character. But it might be that until she's satisfied Will won't try to manipulate people into believing his actions were without fault, she doesn't want to give him the chance. Which is... unfortunate, but between them until it becomes an issue of Will's personal health. Speculation on my part, but it makes sense to me."
Malcolm nods slowly, watches Neal start taking tea things down. Watching him make tea is soothing. Him knowing where Malcolm's tea stuff is is soothing.
"If Root did something serious and Tim told her she could only have limited supervised visits for the foreseeable future... do you think she'd just be like 'okay' and go about her day?"
He's really asking. Maybe he is the unreasonable one.
"Honestly, I'm not sure." Neal's lips pinch into a tight frown again. "I don't have enough experience with their dynamic yet to know. But I am pretty sure that Root herself wouldn't tolerate it, and given what I know about Shaw I can't imagine her saying 'okay' without quietly self-immolating in the process."
It takes effort not to put the mugs down much harder than necessary. "Is that what she said? That, indefinitely, you and Will need to be supervised?"
He manages not to add like a pair of kids on a playground out of spite.
"She said Will will be supervised. But. At all times. And not... she'll be sitting outside his door. She'll be in the room." He watches Neal's hands. "She said she has to keep it from happening again but if keeping it from happening again means sitting on him 24 hours a day, then he's not really learning how to control himself, is he? She's a prosthetic."
Neal makes a noncommittal noise at that. "Regardless, immediately after she puts the measure in place isn't the time to ask about exceptions. If anything she'll take it as you trying to get around her authority, or you being over-emotional at the idea, or you trying to tell Will that he bears no fault and needn't consider alternatives to murder before going that far."
He tries not to clench his jaw. "And the more you tell her that no, you literally just want to know when you might be able to have a private moment again, the more she'll insist that you don't know your own mind until you snap at her and she says you've proved her point."
"I don't want that," Malcolm says. "Why is everything a trap? I'm... I don't want to control how he's taught or what consequences he faces. But he just went through something traumatic and awful and I want to be there for him and why is that supposed to be bad for him? He's like me. He's never had anyone who wanted to be there for him when things were bad. Isn't that good for him? Isn't it good for him that people care and want to... to help him through it emotionally?"
"It shouldn't be a trap," he says, frustrated. "I don't know why it is. I don't know why some people on board are so addicted to being right that even when you absolutely lose your mind with frustration at them, they won't consider that maybe there's a reason for that."
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It's not stupid. Come over and see George. Pet something soft. I'll make tea.
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[His voice is unsteady and he’s fidgeting more than usual.]
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He unclips the leash to let George roam, comes and sets his tea mix offering on the kitchen island, and hugs Malcolm tight. Shaw's voice whispers at him-- He hurts and alienates people left and right, and you care more about people responding badly and 'shitting on him' than you do about that.
Neal tightens the hug. "Talk to me."
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"I don't like this," he whispers, and he doesn't mean the hug. "It feels dangerous. Like she could take him away somewhere. I don't like it. I feel like something menacing is creeping up the back of my neck but I can't see what it is."
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"None of your friends or Will's friends would let that happen in any long-term way. If she, as his warden, feels the need to isolate him for a few days based on the incident, she is his warden, and from what I can tell people are matched for good reasons. Even if we can't always tell what they are."
He kisses Malcolm's forehead. "But no one, least of all me, is going to let the two of you be permanently separated because you're fucking upset that your boyfriend felt pushed to kill someone in preemptive self-defense."
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"This person tortured him and stabbed him before. They stabbed John Doe on the space station. When they said they would do it to him again, he had no reason not to believe them. I'm not saying his response was proportionate; I'm saying it was understandable and he was defending himself. He shouldn't have to wait until the knife is actually in his back to start doing that when the person threatening him definitely means it and has harmed him before."
Malcolm's eyes search Neal's face for his response to that.
"She said telling him he didn't do anything wrong wasn't helping. But that... wasn't exactly what I said but... Avalon was the aggressor, not Will."
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"Yeah, Shaw is very good at deciding what you've said and then refusing to listen to you when you tell her she's got it wrong."
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"Something happened between you and Shaw," he murmurs. It slips out before he can remind himself to rephrase it as a question. Then he catches it and opens his mouth and closes it and stammers "I mean... did something happen? You seem upset."
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He takes a slow breath and exhales. "Shaw and I had a disagreement. She suggested I couldn't be unbiased when it comes to you, and she's right, but she also discounted my ability to consider anyone's feelings other than yours and then informed me that it wasn't a personal failing, and when I tried to tell her she was wrong, she double or perhaps tripled down. And I hung up on her. We haven't talked since."
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That's his impulse. Because God knows he's half angry at and half scared of Shaw right now, but he knows how much she means to Neal.
"What can I do?" he asks, absently tugging a wrinkle out of Neal's sleeve.
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"I think it's more that she's in her own information-gathering stage. It looks different than yours with Kikimora, but again, that doesn't mean it's necessarily wrong. She hasn't decided how to proceed and until she has the data she needs, she won't be able to give anyone a definitive timeline. I don't know Will well enough to say, but if this kind of... preemptive self-defense was one of his issues before the Barge, it could be what she's trying to address."
He loosens his hold on Malcolm experimentally to see how the man reacts, and if it's not bad, Neal will start making them both tea. "I also don't think she's worried about your influence on Will as much as she might be concerned about his influence on you. She has minimal respect for you and minimal respect for my estimations of your character. But it might be that until she's satisfied Will won't try to manipulate people into believing his actions were without fault, she doesn't want to give him the chance. Which is... unfortunate, but between them until it becomes an issue of Will's personal health. Speculation on my part, but it makes sense to me."
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"If Root did something serious and Tim told her she could only have limited supervised visits for the foreseeable future... do you think she'd just be like 'okay' and go about her day?"
He's really asking. Maybe he is the unreasonable one.
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It takes effort not to put the mugs down much harder than necessary. "Is that what she said? That, indefinitely, you and Will need to be supervised?"
He manages not to add like a pair of kids on a playground out of spite.
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"She said Will will be supervised. But. At all times. And not... she'll be sitting outside his door. She'll be in the room." He watches Neal's hands. "She said she has to keep it from happening again but if keeping it from happening again means sitting on him 24 hours a day, then he's not really learning how to control himself, is he? She's a prosthetic."
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He tries not to clench his jaw. "And the more you tell her that no, you literally just want to know when you might be able to have a private moment again, the more she'll insist that you don't know your own mind until you snap at her and she says you've proved her point."
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...Wait.
Fuck.
That's Peter.
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These are clearly relationship adjectives he's heard before as Bad Things.
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"No, it's fucking not."
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"Thank you."
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literally a month later......
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