[PRP] Still awake (Jordan & Rep)

[prolixity]

Nightmares. Again, the nightmares. Jordan hadn't gotten a full, restful night of sleep for a good week. This time, it was the Lair, fleeing blindly through the dark, a moment of respite, and then Sandy and Barney's screams following them up the elevator as he stood helpless, powerless to save them, powerless to even try; and the dream froze, looped, ran back, and it was his parents screaming, his brother; it looped again, and it was his friends' voices, Jerry, Robert, Madison, Petra, Ennea, Harrison, Candace, Rep ... over and over, a loop of agony and helplessness, Ferros absent somehow, gone to nowhere, and Jordan was trapped until he woke again, unable even to scream.

He fell out of bed this time, the covers dragging after him as the impact woke him abruptly, and lay limp on the floor for long seconds, trying to catch his breath. He was alone and not-alone, Ferros sleeping still, though lightly and uneasily; the dragon's heavy sleeping presence was a partial comfort, but Jordan needed to see for himself that his friends were still alive.

The sounds that were faintly audible behind Robert's door made it clear that he and Petra were definitely okay. More than okay, even. Jordan half-smiled and turned back down the hall. Not a good time to interrupt, clearly. Still, he didn't want to be alone right now. Most people would be asleep at this time of night; he wasn't going to bother Maddie, and things were still awkward between him and Jerry, besides the whole thing with Killzone being a live-in therapist.

Rep had offered to keep him company if he had nightmares again, he remembered. He wasn't sure he should disturb the red-haired man; but the alternative was going back to his own room and falling back into the sickening dreams, and that he didn't want at all.

A minute later, he was tapping hesitantly at Rep's door. If the guy was asleep, Jordan told himself, he'd just - go out to the cafeteria or one of the training runs or something.  

[Baneful]

It had been utterly relentless since Rep had managed to complain enough to get himself out of the Life labs. He'd not slept more than an hour at a time, when he did slip into sleep, the result was the dreamless sleep of complete body shut down. He didn't dare linger more than that. Whenever he let himself drift, he relived that gut wrenching terror of the lair, the screech of hordes of wheeling scratching terrors, the very jaws of death, Stan, ripped to shreds and written on the floor.

And his team. The team he couldn't even defend. Because he was weak.

He was trapped in what felt like a place neither sleeping nor awake. Night was the worst, there was no one around to talk to, to stave off the wracking tiredness. Coffee didn't help anymore, it only made his nerves worse, made the memories more vivid. He really wasn't coping at all but he had nowhere left to turn, and his pride meant even if he did, he couldn't dare do so.

A faint knock at the door and he sat up with a wince as the various injuries he'd sustained, mending but still stitched and bandaged in places protested the action. Did he really hear that or was he just hallucinating? He checked his phone, it was way too late for social visits.

Still, he couldn't ignore it, and swinging his legs off the bed he wandered over to open the door, dressed in nothing but his denims and necklace, ready to give someone or other an earful for interrupting his staring blankly at the ceiling sleep.

And stopped.

"Jordan?"

 

[prolixity]

Jordan looked tired; more than that, he looked stretched thin, the corners of his eyes tight, his carefully controlled calm brittle and closer to breaking than Rep had yet seen. "Oh, good, you're up," he said, a kind of strained brightness in his tone. "Nightmares - I, uh, remembered what you said - mind keeping me company until I'm not tweaking out from bad dreams?"

He was half sure Rep would slam the door in his face, insecurities and phobias surfacing; he braced himself for rejection, tired and lonely and certain that he was alone.  

[Baneful]

Rep's heart utterly raced at the situation he found himself in. Anyone else. Anyone else in his life and he'd have tried to joke and shrug it off, shooing them away for the sake of his own "manly reputation" or whatever it was he was calling it at that point in time. But the other sun hunter. He couldn't. He never could and he knew it, the guy had been one of the only people to actually take him aside and explain things to him, took the time to bother to get past his many /many/ issues. And ******** hell, he looked about as tired and frazzled as Rep felt.

Still he was so torn. Would inviting him in be weird? Would it bother him? Good ******** god the dilemmas, he was way too stressed out to deal with them. Too ******** tired to give a s**t about his own hang ups. He'd admitted to Tracey he needed people. He did. And apparently, people also seemed to need him, even if he guessed to himself he was the last on the list of choices.

He smiled weakly. "Yeah. I'm up. I've been up for.. eh lets say a while. Long enough I've lost track man." He stepped back from the door a little, stomach outright fluttering at the terror this situation could go completely wrong and he could end up offending the other man. As far as he was concerned, everyone shared his hang ups, and if some guy invited him into their room, he'd have been upset and probably offended.

But ******** it. He'd stick his neck out. "You want to come in?"

 

[prolixity]

An unexpected surge of relief, strong enough to be almost dizzying. Jordan took a breath, smiled tiredly. "Thanks, dude," he said, and stepped into the room, his eyes lingering for a moment on the extensive tattoos Rep sported, then sliding away before the glance could be called weird or awkward. "We could play cards or something. I just - the Lair - it wasn't Barney, man, it was my brother," and he ran his hand through his hair, ducking his head so the grief and anguish in his eyes wouldn't be visible.  

[Baneful]

Rep kicked the door closed lazily with his foot and wandered over to sit on his unmade bed, giving the entire room a sort of dismal look. Empty coffee mugs covered a lot of the surfaces and the small bin seemed to be full of bandage dressings. Clothes were pretty much left where they fell on the floor. "Sorry about the mess." he stated. "I've been out of it."

He gestured with a thumb at the bed beside him, an invitation to sit if Jordan was so inclined.

He paused for just a moment, resting his chin on his hand, giving the other man a curious look, uncertain whether to pry or not, finally deciding right now he wanted to know enough he didn't care if he got asked to back off. He tried to be as subtle as it was possible for him to be.

"Your brother?"

 

[prolixity]

Jordan hesitated only a moment; he was still tired and hazy from losing sleep. He sat down on the bed, though even now he was careful to keep a socially acceptable space between them. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah. My little brother. Andrew. Andy. ********, I miss him so much." He rested his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands, lingering suppressed grief surfacing all at once.

Andy, curled up with him to keep away from the monster under the bed. Andy, drawing people, drawing places, drawing the things that they both saw that nobody else believed. Andy, needing protection and help, needing safety that Jordan couldn't ever fully give him.

Andy, mangled and dead in the aftermath of the crash that had killed him.

"He's - " dead, I promised to keep him safe and I couldn't - "gone." Maybe he would have been here, with his own weapon, fighting with me at last.  

[Baneful]

It was so strange to see Jordan this shaken, to see this very human side of him. He always cut such an impossibly immovable figure, unreadable, as if nothing ever bothered him. But after their last conversation he'd had the feeling it did. He'd realised he was just very very good at keeping it all bottled up. His brother. He remembered the passing comment last time, about how people died and there was nothing anyone could do about it. And finally he understood.

God, he wanted to save everyone, but he hadn't been able to save his brother. It struck a chord in Rep that he didn't even understand. When he'd tried to save his mother and lost her anyway, he'd gone the other way, he'd sworn only to care about himself.

He didn't think he'd wanted to hug anyone so much in his life. But knew he couldn't. He couldn't dare. It would be an insult to the other man's pride wouldn't it? Saying he was worthy of pity. When it wasn't pity at all.

"That sucks man." It sounded like such a flippant phrase and for a moment he really hated his inability to say what he meant. "I ..I mean.. I never had any siblings. But I know what like.. loss and s**t is like man. It never goes away. But..like. well." he leaned sliiightly in the other man's direction. "Back home right? My gran when she was alive always used to say. "What's for you will no go by you". Sometimes things are meant to happen and there's nothing anyone could ever have done about it."

He frowns. "Probably sounds kind of defeatist I guess man, but its not. Doesn't mean we shouldn't like fight. Just means there's a reason when we lose. At least that's what keeps me going sometimes." He felt silly explaining how he coped with deaths, felt as if he was being embarrassingly sentimental and probably making the other guy uncomfortable. "Sorry, I doubt its any comfort or anything mate."

 

[prolixity]

Surprisingly philosophical, unusually perceptive for Rep - Jordan looked up, tried to keep the startlement he felt from showing in his expression. "I'm - I used to be religious, man," he said. "Don't think any more. Just there's so much that - <********>," and he covered his face with his hands again, breathed carefully in rhythm, swallowed down the lump in his throat and the sting in his eyes.

He couldn't cry, not here, not now. He didn't cry, he wouldn't, his pride and his strength were wavering painfully on the edge of breakdown, and maybe he shouldn't have come, maybe he should have gone to one of his team, except that to his Phoenixes he was A1, strong and protective and fair, and he couldn't break, not for them, not ever, except he'd helped Rep and maybe Rep wouldn't despise him completely, but he missed Andy so much and he hadn't even let himself think of it.  

[Baneful]

There was nothing judgemental in Rep's expression as he eyed the other man. His instincts to attack people's weaknesses before they could get to his own didn't apply here, Jordan had seen his weaknesses. Perceived them right ******** through the walls he'd built up over the years. And made it look easy. He could see the pain he had to be struggling with, probably for a very very long time and felt nothing but empathy. "I doubt there's a religion in the world that covers hunters."

God it made his heart hurt to watch the struggle he was going through. He knew how it felt. Had walked that dark and lonely ******** place, or as close to it as he could imagine. He couldn't just sit here stupidly while one of the few people he'd ever learned to respect went through that. Because of a question he'd asked. He'd never forgive himself.

He reached an arm around behind Jordan to give his far shoulder a squeeze. A hug. For most people it would have been an effortless action of comfort. Easy, and natural. For Rep it was riddled with self doubt and fear, that terror of making the situation go all wrong without warning. "It's all right man. Seriously. I told you I was here. And I am. " An unspoken promise he would /never/ judge the man for what he felt. He hadn't ever expected Jordan to take him up on the offer, after all, why would anyone want to come to him when all he did was hide his own problems and pretend everything was okay?
 

[prolixity]

"Yeah, I - it just - when the whole world doesn't even know we're here, what we're doing," Jordan said, and swallowed hard. How could he believe in a benevolent God if God allowed humans to be terrorized, killed, eaten, enslaved by Halloween? How could he accept that a greater outside force took care of them all when ignorance and fear was allowed to rule the whole species?

Rep's words and his cautious touch were unexpected, but deeply comforting. For someone so afraid to touch and reach out to sympathize and let Jordan be weak, just for a little while, and not judge or cast him down - that was a shock and a relief, and Jordan took a deep, sobbing breath, and couldn't help crying almost silently into his hands, shoulders shaking just slightly, eyes shut tight.  

[Baneful]

He could only nod in agreement. "I know man, I know. And even the people here. So many of them don't care either." He frowned deeply, remembering the way Cael had looked at them. Disposable. Irrelevant. Bait. They'd given up every ******** thing they had, no matter how little that was, to fight a war for people who generally didn't give a ******** about them. He'd only been here a short time and he was already close to breaking, had already come close to death. He could only imagine how the other man felt when he shouldered so much of a burden and been here for longer.

Very subtly he glanced sidelong at Jordan and frowned to himself, wishing there was more he could do, wishing he could ease his evident pain, angry only at himself. It was hard to keep his own emotions in check as he was just quietly /there/ for a few long moments, nothing awkward about it, his hand still there, still as reassuring as he dared to be. He wanted to hug him closer and the realisation made him almost panic. Now that would end badly he was sure. Wouldn't it?

"L..Listen man." Man it was hard to talk. So ******** hard. "We give them that. We give them not knowing. That's all we /can/ give them. And its more than they ******** deserve. The world gave me nothing, I always resented coming here to fight for them." he frowned "Last..last mission though. We nearly died. All of us. And I realised I don't actually fight for them. I fight for you guys. I don't need their respect."

He had to fall silent himself, battling his own lump in his throat, his own emotions.

He gave Jordan a squeeze, giving him as long as he needed, asking nothing of him. "You were one of the first people in my entire life man to give a s**t about my respect or to give me any when I didn't give you an ounce. You were.." ********, he didn't want to sound creepy.

"You mean a lot okay man. You do. Don't always carry other people's troubles, sometimes yeah, you need to let them carry yours."

 

[prolixity]

"They don't - I don't want to be that," Jordan said into his hands. "I can't not care. Sometimes I want to. I can't."

He dropped his hands between his knees, head bowed, throat half-closed with grief and anger, anger turned both in and out, with no specific target but himself. "I wish - I want to be able to kill all the monsters in the closets and under the beds and in the empty houses so the little scared kids aren't scared any more. So it doesn't matter that nobody believes that there's really a monster. So they don't have to."

He kept his eyes on the floor, focused between his feet, shoulders slumped and head bowed. "Thank you," he said after long moments. "You understand. Nobody understood. Nobody - Jesus, I - " his shoulders trembled with tension and long-held pain.  

[Baneful]

"Caring too much is worse than not caring at all. You spread yourself too thinly. It hurts to watch someone you care about do that." But he wasn't condemning it, wasn't asking Jordan to change. "Not caring about people has its pitfalls too though you know. For one thing, they hate you instead of love you. Its just a different kind of stress, it crushes you all the same." As Jordan curled up, he wanted to try and coax him back, feeling as if he was being shut out as if the other man was turning his pain inward far too much. He wanted to reach out but found himself at a loss on how to do so after so many years of trying to cut off other people. And it hurt more than he thought it would.

He understood though the tenacity in Jordan's words, empathised with it. "That's what makes us suns I think. Its what makes us strong. Its that ******** /passion/. We have to want it so badly, so so ******** badly it hurts. Care so deeply that it burns you out, that you ******** /blaze/ when it comes to the fight. But you burn yourself out man. You give everything for the cause, for other people. You leave yourself nothing. At least.. that's how I feel. I know I'm a p***k and stuff. But if I could drive all the ******** nightmares out of this world, I would do it man. I would do it in a heartbeat. But I get so angry sometimes. At the world, at everyone, mostly at myself though for not being able to do it, despite all the effort I throw at it." He shivered, it wasn't cold, but it felt colder now he was no longer near the other man.

Reaching out he patted Jordan's back, still tentatively, as if he expected anger in return for his gesture. He'd been conditioned that way a long time. It was unmanly. "I should be thanking you man. More than anyone else. I can't talk to anyone else...like this." Honestly, openly. "It makes all the difference not to be alone."

All the ******** difference in the world.



 

[prolixity]

"All or nothing, huh," Jordan mused, and rubbed a hand over his eyes, trying to wipe away the remaining dampness there without being too obvious about it. "I hadn't thought of it quite that way. You're right, I think. You get angry more openly than I, but it's there. I can fight them all my life, and that's good, better than hiding it, but still, I can't do enough."

It was nice to be touched, a simple, very human contact and comfort. "Heh. Not really anyone I can talk to much either," he admitted. "Odd pair we are, huh?" A slow, tired smile. "But it's good not to be alone."

That he trusted this abrasive, aggressive man - unexpected, strange, but his sense of isolation had eased a little.