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It was sometime after Ian's birthday party. Ripley had been out of the infirmary for a couple of days and was likely feeling much better. Finn had, quite unintentionally, avoided the other man in this time, busy with various shifts to make up for those that he had taken off in order to be Ripley's own personal tormentor.

Some of those shifts gave him time to think. Pod and lighthouse duty were usually pretty uneventful, and boring, and often left him with nothing but his own thoughts to amuse him. Thinking had proven to be tedious, however, as the one giant elephant sized thing on his mind was precisely the one thing he had been trying to avoid mulling over. But it was there, unrelenting, and had been since that night on Halloween, when he had spoken to Jack, or perhaps it had started earlier than that and he had just refused to acknowledge it back than.

But it seemed he was prepared to acknowledge it now. Prepared enough that he was on his way to Ripley's room, unannounced (and perhaps hoping just a little bit that the other man wasn't in). He stopped outside of his door, hand going to the handle, until he thought better of it and instead lifted knuckles up to knock.

"Hey, you in?" He called through the door, hand dropping back to the doorknob once more.

There was, however briefly, a moment when the silence on the other end side of the door seemed absolutely golden. Ripley wasn't in, which meant that Finn could delay the inevitable for at least one more day. He was just about to turn away to leave, when a sound, or rather several, caught his attention and held it. Ripley hadn't said anything in response to his shout, but there were definite signs of life coming from the other side of that door. A thud, the sound of a chair being pushed out, the muffled foot steps that moved steadily towards the door just moments before the handle turned and the door swung open.

His insides twisted. Okay than, Ripley was in. Finn's hands had dropped to the pocket on the front of his jacket, and a small smile graced his lips as he made to shuffle himself inside.

But then, a gloved fist. An explosion of pain that radiated from the center of his face, up the bridge of his nose, to the corners of his eyes, throughout his forehead. Pain to make his eyes water. Pain that followed a sharp crack that surely would have indicated a broken nose had he not had a shield to prevent it, though Trynt seemed unwilling to block the agony that followed. A choked, indignant and pain filled sound tore free from his throat as his head bowed, his hands coming up to his nose, and angry words were quick to follow.

"Jesus <********>, Ripley. You stupid son of a whore! What the ******** hell!" He leaned against the doorframe, face still buried behind his hands. He was sure that at any moment he would feel blood pouring out of his nose, though the sensation never came.

Finn would have watched Ripley watching him, but his eye was blurred and watery, so he had closed it while waiting for the throbbing pain to slowly ebb away to something much less awful, though he had a feeling he was going to be pretty tender in the nose area for at least a day. With a sniffle that had absolutely nothing to do with crying ******** you Ripley, and a few more curses uttered under his breath, he took in Ripley's words and underlying threat with a now angry resentment.

"Well then, I guess you'd never pull another ******** stunt like you did in the haunted house, ******** face." He retorted, his eye opening enough to give the other man a narrow eyed glare, before one hand lowered and reached out to snag for the ice pack.

He had more than half a mind to turn away and leave at that point, but he made himself stay, his jaw flexing as his teeth clenched to prevent himself from saying something stupid or that he would likely regret.

"I'm not asking you to never wind up in the infirmary again, I'm asking you to have some common ******** sense." Another loud sniff, and Finn was lowering his hand from a nose that was very red and more than a little swollen, though he was still sure that it couldn't have been broken. A few gentle prods with the fingers on his free hand, and he was gingerly bringing the ice back up to press against it, narrowed eye going back to Ripley. "So yes, port the ******** out next time, if that option is available." He shrugged his shoulders, and seemed to be content to leave it at that.

If only.

As he continued to nurse his poor damaged face, he leaned back enough to look down either end of the hallway, only now thinking to see if anybody was standing around watching the exchange, and only just realizing that he was indeed standing within a wide open doorway. Thankfully, the coast was clear, so he stepped inside, swiping at the door with a foot to kick it closed behind himself.

He was still angry. He was trying not to be, but he was. The punch, and Ripley's explanation for it combined with his pleading and attempt at deal making were only worsening everything, making him think too much, making him hold too much in lest he say something horrible, making his head hurt something fierce (and the throbbing that was shooting into his forehead certainly wasn't helping).

Still, he took a few deep breaths, and didn't speak for a few long moments.

"I can't promise anything, Ripples. You know that. You know who I am and how I am and until now, you've been incredibly patient. That's more than I deserve, really, I know that, and I am thankful, but I just..." He stopped, and sighed. This already wasn't going well. He could feel himself pushing. Pushing himself away, creating distance, boarding away his feelings, putting them away where he wouldn't need to deal with them, and already deciding it wasn't going to work, because it just wasn't worth it.

But then his conversation with Jack came back to him. They had been drunk, of course, but still. What they had talked about had helped him decide not to walk away, and he needed to see this through as he had said that he would.

"I can try, if that's enough for you, but even if it isn't... I can't, Ripley, I just can not stand the thought of you going like that. All I could think about when they brought you in was that you had done it on purpose. Did you actually want to die? Is that why you didn't port out? Because I've been ******** asking myself that every ******** day." And it hurt. It actually ******** hurt him emotionally to think that Ripley had, essentially, attempted suicide in the Haunted House. It hurt in ways that Finn didn't want to have to explain to anybody, including himself. It was an unfamiliar feeling in very unfamiliar territory, but he did know that it was frightening. The thought that Ripley might mean more to him than he ever thought he could was absolutely terrifying. Enough so that he had been, a not so long ago, seriously considering ending things.

But instead he was here, talking, because that's what he had said he would do.

He wondered if he could actually still make a break for the door instead.

It was really hard to remain focused through the headache and the pain and his own sleep deprivation. It was hard, but he gave it his best attempt, anyways. And on top of that, he felt silly, with a swollen (and by now likely bruised as well) nose, an ice pack pressed against it, and yet trying to explain himself, if it was even worth trying to do so, attempting to rationalize his own behaviour.

Ripley's question was met with a half shrug and a lip curled back into a sneer. "I don't know. I didn't know and couldn't know without asking. All I knew was that it made me unhappy. Very ******** unhappy."

He let out a sigh then, and rather than stand around feeling like he was making a complete fool of himself, he moved towards the bed and eased himself down onto the edge of it.

"Anyways, I doubt what I think is all that important to you anyways." No bitterness, as it was just a plain fact to him. "I came here to-" a pause, revulsion sweeping through him at the thought of what he was about to do before he quickly stamped it out.

"I came here to tell you something, and after that you can do whatever the hell you want."

The information that Ripley (finally) gave to him on just what the ******** had happened in that house was filed away with hardly a reaction besides a small nod and an expression that had gone smooth as he managed to store his own anger away for the time being. His forehead and nose still throbbed, but as the pain began to ease so did his urge to start a fight. He had noted that Ripley had kept his distance, and that was probably quite an intelligent maneuver on the other mans behalf, especially since Finn's auto reaction could have been to punch back, or to grab him and throw him into a wall, or any number of counter attacks, fueled by anger and pain.

"Good to know. Now." He finally said, adjusting himself on the bed, his elbow on his knee, his face resting in a hand still clutching an ice pack.

He accepted the offer of pills and water, sitting up straighter and lowering the ice so that he could pop the former into his mouth, unscrewing the top of the latter to take a couple of swigs before offering it back and reuniting his face with icy cold relief.

"Yes, but only so that I don't have to ******** look up at you." He replied, a small smirk on his lips to show that it wasn't that bad Ripley, come on, even if inwardly he felt like it was that bad. Feelings were definitely always that bad.

He waited for Ripley to sit, though even if he chose not to Finn eventually would continue, watching him carefully while he did so.

"This isn't easy for me to admit, by the way, let me just make that clear right now. I don't do well with....feelings." He barely managed to get the word out, and actually sounded rather disgusted with himself for having made himself say it. "But I--" Another pause, because really, why was he doing this again?

But then he decided to just man the ******** up and he plunged forward. "I like you. A lot. I've become rather attached to you in the sense that, if you were gone, I think I would be more than a just little bit upset. I think that it would actually hurt."

Another brief pause while he waited for what he was saying to register, and he continued again. "And as you probably noticed, I might like pain, and not punch to the face pain, you ********, but I don't like hurt. I don't like being that close or that involved or feeling like there's a potential for things to get, well, messy." He took in a slow, deep breath, as for a moment he felt like that was it, he had unloaded what he had meant to and now, and with a few more words he could just end things, the explanation for doing so given, and they could just go back. Go back to being friends and nothing more.

"But." The word came almost unbidden to his lips, "I'm not going to use that as an excuse to end our arrangement. I don't actually want to change things at all. I just wanted you to know that....I like you, and it might stop, or it might get worse. And if that's going to be a problem, well, I guess then you have the right to make your own decision on how things proceed." A shrug of his shoulders, and he was pulling the ice pack away from his face again with a slight grimace, the cold becoming too much to bear for a moment.

"Of course, this was all before you punched me in the face. I might need to do some serious reassessing." He half-joked, with the most dead pan facial expression and flat voice he could manage.

Flat out ask if Ripley was suicidal and expect an honest answer? Not a chance. Either the question itself would be considered a joke or even if it wasn't, Finn would have never known if the truth was being told or not. Even now, with Ripley's full explanation, he had his own small doubts, but he neatly filed those away, no longer wishing to spend any more time on contemplating it, as he'd had his fill already.

And so, Ripley's statement garnered no response, that bit of nastiness now dealt with, in Finn's mind at least. He wasn't about to beat a dead horse or dredge up the same topic again and again when he had other matters to deal with.

Such as the one currently on the table. Ripley's small show of confusion was noted, but was not an unexpected reaction. He had likely been just as sure that Finn was going to end it, just as Finn himself had been sure once, before he began to over think things, before his conversation with Jack. Hell, just go for it. That was the advice he had been given, and he could find no fault in the green haired giants logic that had followed, drunk logic though it was.

The broken eye contact told him little except that Ripley was likely thinking, and the fact that he was doing so came as some surprise to Finn, who expected a more immediate rejection. Instead, it seemed, he was going to be subject to something slightly more drawn out, which was frankly quite irritating to him, though that irritation didn't show. What was the point? To give him hope? It wasn't hope that he needed right now. Right now he just wanted Ripley to figure his s**t out and give him an answer.

But instead of telling him as much, he continued to wait. Ripley told him he deserved the punch and Finn merely smiled in response, that usual cold smile that could have meant anything and gave away nothing of what he was thinking, before saying, "I'm sure in some instances, I've deserved a lot worse." After all, he'd done some pretty shitty things since waking up on Deus, and only once before had he been severely punished (see: The Cael Incident). He had more to say. Ridiculously inappropriate and dirty things. But he bit them back, and continued to wait while Ripley continued to keep his gaze diverted.

And then it was Finn's turn to blink slowly, though his own thoughts were whirring away much quicker than the delay of his reaction. Of course, he had expected a much faster response. This was not a scenario he had envisioned, and for a moment, he found himself not knowing how to answer. Of course, he wanted the decision made sooner rather than later. He didn't want to be left wondering! He didn't want to (ugh) begin to hope that maybe, just maybe, Ripley was willing to continue with what they had even though it was beginning to get muddled. He was so sure that it would end in a disappointment that he would then have to pretend didn't exist.

He reached up with a free hand to run fingers through his hair and let out a hiss of air that was a lot like a sigh, before he gave his answer. "Well, I don't see any reason why you should have to give it now....." He saw plenty. "Take all the time you need, Ripples." A smirk, though even that action somehow managed to hurt his face.

"But in the meantime, until you decide, I guess that means the arrangement still stands." The smirk widened. "So that meeeaaaans...." His voice trailed off and his head cocked to the side slightly.

"You should take your clothes off."

Or, you know, he could leave. But where was the fun in that?

Time only meant that Finn could have a last time. He might have demanded an answer, had he thought that it might be a favourable one, but as is, he fully expected this to be the end of whatever they'd had going, and even if feelings hadn't been involved, he didn't think he'd be overly enthusiastic about it's finality. Ripley's stalling was quite obnoxious to Finn, but if it meant getting to play the rules card and have him one more time....well, it seemed that in suggesting it at least, he'd really had nothing to lose.

So he smiled, the same way as he always did, the ice pack lowered to the edge of his bed at his side, and he waited for what could either be refusal or acceptance of his bold and shameless request.

He had to chuckle at Ripley's answer, as it managed to be an agreement but in the only way the other man seemed to know how, by being just a little bit difficult and slightly oppositional, though those two traits could also very in degree in different circumstances.

But this Finn could easily handle. He had pushed himself off of the bed immediately, crossing that short space to where Ripley sat and reaching out to hook a finger into the other mans shirt to haul him forward, forcing him to either pull away, get dragged to the floor, or stand up.