MASK OR MENACE - contact.

[hostage]

( previous )

Comments

[rathercommon]

But it is. Do you really think people won't care about what happens to you?

[hostage]

They shouldn't

It's all temporary anyway

[rathercommon]

Why shouldn't they?

[hostage]

You're gonna call me a martyr but

A good person shouldn't suffer when a bad one can suffer instead

[rathercommon]

No, I'm going to call you overly tied to labels. You can't categorize people like that.

[hostage]

I can and I will

I've killed a lot of people

Now just let me try and save a few

[rathercommon]

Jesse - do you think I'm bad? I've killed people too. I can just about guarantee I've killed more than you've done.

[hostage]

Were they innocent?

[rathercommon]

We planted bombs. Uninvolved people got hurt.

[hostage]

[He wishes this could surprise him, but nothing really surprises him anymore.]

Then yes

[rathercommon]

[ Right. She rubs her mouth, swallows. It hurts a little. Less than she'd have thought it would. ]

OK. So I deserve to be hurt?

[hostage]

I'm not Lunatic

I don't make those choices for other people

But if you had a power like mine I'd say you should use it

[rathercommon]

Because I'm bad. I ought to feel pain for the rest of my days. That's it?

[hostage]

People are gone from the world forever because you existed

I'd say you ought to consider whether there's a way to even out the numbers

But I wouldn't want you to suffer for no reason if that's what you're asking me

[rathercommon]

[ No, okay, this - does really hurt. She takes that earlier bit of arrogance back. ]

It was a war, you know.

[hostage]

You don't have to defend yourself with me

[rathercommon]

Does that constitute a defense, then? That I was fighting for democracy, against oppression. That I'm fighting now against slavery. Does that defend me at all? Or am I still placed into your easily-delineated category of 'bad,' separated out from the 'good.'

[hostage]

Most evil people have a good reason for what they're doing

That doesn't change what they've done

If you want me to tell you that what you did was OK then you're gonna be disappointed

[rathercommon]

OK. I'll be straightforward with what I want. I don't think I'm bad, and I think that you trying to make these strict categories is hurtful to yourself. I KNOW it's already been hurtful to me. When I was young, I was recruited into an organization that did bad things that I now quite detest. And now, now that I'm older and know more things, I've learned that that sort of violence isn't the way to make life better. And so I try to help people. I also lose my temper and blow my top when I think people are wrong, and I curse madly and buy drinks with a fake ID. And I care for my loser of a roommate. There's good and bad in me, inextricable, swirling around. I'm both things, sometimes at the same time, doing charitable works cause deep down I want to look good and be admired and getting angry cause I see injustice. I'm complex. You are too. Good people, bad people - there are no such things. And I wish I could go and bash the face in of whoever convinced you that there were.

[hostage]

Don't worry, he's dead now

I'm sorry about what happened to you, Kitty

[rathercommon]

Don't say sorry. I wasn't a victim. I joined because I was angry and frustrated and wanted to really break some skulls in revenge for what had been done to me. That's just what I mean - I wasn't a naive innocent good young thing then. I didn't cross the boundary from good into evil the moment I took a life. I'm always in flux. You are too. All of us are.

Anyway. Who was 'he'?

[hostage]

[He understands what she's saying, but it's difficult to swallow. Too easy to wave aside one's past crimes and call it a phase.]

He was my teacher

He was here for a while

Walter White

[rathercommon]

I know the name.

[ He seemed... she starts to write, and then thinks that there's no assessment of his character that she can give that will be remotely helpful. Sweet? (Because he did seem that at times.) Ineffectual? Frequently drunk? Awkward? Largely awkward. Old. ]

What did he do?

[hostage]

Make a list of every disgusting evil thing a person could do and he's done it

If you ask me who's worse between Walt and Lucifer I'd say Walt no question

[rathercommon]

I guess I meant more what did he do to you. That screwed you up. If it's OK if I put it that way.

[ A therapist this girl ain't. ]