milliways_bar | (no subject)

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It's April First, and Charlie works somewhere that doesn't allow much in the way of pranks.

Really, she's just as happy with this. And quite happy that Bar's seen fit to let this state of affairs continue -- though others here don't seem to have been so lucky.

Oh well. As long as no one gets hurt.

Right now she's sitting on one of the couches by the fireplace, sipping a mocha and reading a newspaper.

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"They're both dead."

It's abrupt.

"Because the people who gave them the drug wanted me."

"I'm sorry." And she is, she really is. Fire knows what it's like to lose parents.

But she doesn't know how to be human, and she doesn't know how to give comfort other then reaching out and squeezing Charlie's shoulder once, quickly.

It's a little like the times one of the kids at Taos will offer something, a word or a gesture, not quite knowing how to do this right but wanting to try.

Charlie spends a lot of time with people who aren't sure how to be human.

"Thank you," she murmurs.

"But the thing is -- I could start fires from when I was a baby. And they couldn't stop me, and I could have hurt them. And myself. Without ever intending to."

Fire drops one shoulder in what could be a shrug, eyes blank. "If you were not intending too, it would not be your fault. Your parents would have understood this."

Or should've, in her opinion.

"Fault or not, they would still be burned. Or I would."

Charlie's hands twine together in her lap, and her voice is carefully even.

"To keep us safe -- to keep me safe -- from my own fire, and from the people who wanted me because of it ... my parents had to teach me to be afraid of it. To never use it, ever."

Her voice is carefully neutral. "We fear that which we do not understand, that which we cannot control. It's survival."

A pause, and Nothingness was afraid and tried to smother, tried to kill, and Fire glances up at Charlie. "You could learn not to be afraid of it, perhaps? If Prometheus does what he says."

"That's what I'm hoping. Because I don't -- I don't want --"

Her voice twists upward and cracks unexpectedly; suddenly, without warning, there are tears burning her eyes. Charlie presses her lips together to still their trembling, and struggles silently for control.

Oh, shit.

Fire doesn't know what to do and she has to try and remember, remember back to when she walked as a mortal and felt as they did and acted like they did. After a moment she reaches a hand out and put it on Charlie's shoulder again, leaving it there, hesitating before the other hand goes out to find Charlie's, trying to hold it.

"Hey," she says, "hey, hey, it's okay. It's okay."

Charlie's hand fumbles for Fire's, and holds it tight.

The thought is in her head, curiously calm and unconnected to anything else around it: My mother had red hair.

Finally she manages to speak, her voice only a little unsteady: "I don't want to be afraid of it anymore."

Fire doesn't know what to say. She closes her eyes, for a second or two, her hand gripping Charlie's tightly.

Finally, she smiles very slightly, and squeezes Charlie's fingers. "I know," she says, her voice quiet. "And you won't be. You will control the fire, not the other way around. You're strong enough, daughter. You can face down the fear."

For is it not better to light a candle then to curse the darkness?

Charlie looks up and smiles, and it's only a little wobbly.

"I hope so," she repeats.

"I know so," Fire informs her, and squeezes her hand one last time before sitting back.

"Things work themselves out, in the end."

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