TLV: Inbox

[tinstar]

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[tinstar]

[What a devastating one two punch. Raylan doesn't blink, but his lips vanish and his jaw works. It's more than cutting to rub in Malcolm's success over his own in his face but suggesting they weren't friends, after he'd been stupid enough to open this all with 'brother', made his stomach drop and twist.

Yeah. He should have known. He should have fucking known.]

Kiss my ass.

[He hangs up.]

[abrightboy]

[He blinks. What?

He sends a text.]

You hung up on me? We’re talking.

[tinstar]

[Raylan sees the message but is smart enough to not respond right away. He was even angrier and more conflicted then when he started and it was better for him to disengage for bit and calm down.

He needed a drink. Or three. A drink instead of burying his fist into a wall or flipping a table. Steve's suggestion of ransacking a random cabin was creeping close into the running for viable options. And so that's what he did, stewing in it all as he works towards even beginning to start to think about answering Malcolm's text.]

[abrightboy]

[Maybe half an hour passes before there’s a knock on Raylan’s door and calls out:]

You got us sidetracked! I need to talk to you. I need your help.

[tinstar]

[He was already two drinks in by the time Malcolm comes knocking on his door and the voice is regarded with a flat, angry look from his side of the door. He had no plans on answering it.

.. Until Malcolm says he needs help. Raylan sighs and scrubs his face with his hand before begrudgingly ambling over. He could leave it shut, yell at Malcolm through it. He could point out from the jump that Malcolm should go talk to someone who's graduated an inmate. Someone who's his 'friend'. But that felt petulant and Raylan really was trying to not give anyone more ammunition.

He opens the door, expression still just as flat.]

What.

[abrightboy]

[Malcolm blinks at him.]

…Are you mad at me? You started that argument. Which I didn’t even really have time for; I was going to come by after dinner anyway. Can I come in?

[tinstar]

[The fact that Malcolm didn't seem to understand what exactly he'd done was astounding. Raylan had started that fight, yes, but he hadn't gone around crossing lines and saying hurtful shit. He supposes that doesn't matter. It never matters.

His jaw works again with a breath out of his nose, and steps back, pulling the door open more.]

[abrightboy]

[Malcolm steps inside, almost immediately turning around and walking backwards so he could keep facing Raylan while he talked.]

Look, I don’t know what part of that did this… [He gestures at Raylan’s whole face.] …But I kind of forgot this is the first time you’ve ever had a sibling, and I’m not sure I could have controlled it anyway, once I got… wound up. I didn’t mean any of it, okay? It’s stupid. I’m just tired of being treated like a joke on this ship and I look up to you a lot and then it suddenly felt like you were looking down at me with them and… It’s just… Remember when I told you that my feelings are too big?

[tinstar]

[Malcolm was right - Raylan didn't know what having a sibling was really like, and he didn't understand sibling fights or how or where they reached to. He also didn't understand how they came back from fights like that.

He kept heading for the kitchen and its island that held his glass and bottle, where he felt he could better handle the swirl of emotions in his gut. Malcolm looking up to him wasn't nothing.]

You're right, I came in swingin' but that shit wasn't about lookin' down on you or thinkin' you hadn't done the job. It was about havin' and takin' the chance to ask what you'd done. Kikimora pisses me off and has been since before the Clipper; it's beyond time somethin' was done with that child.

[He fetches a second glass from the cabinet and comes back to empty his own before refilling them both with a few fingers. The fact that he was pouring for two at all was a good sign. He was still angry, but not angry enough to forgo basic hospitality.

Malcolm better drink though.]

[abrightboy]

She's not a child.

[He picks up the glass, even if it's a little absently.]

She's emotionally stunted and she has a lot of problems around authority and power and most of it is based in trauma, though some of it is cultural. I just... couldn't believe, after everything that happened, that you wouldn't assume I'd done something substantial about an incident of violence by my inmate. Was it because it was against Laura that you thought maybe I wouldn't?

[tinstar]

But she's like three foot nothin'. That can't be full grown.

[But that point was lost under another furrow of his brow.]

You're not listenin' to me, Malcolm. I don't assume on 'substance' because it's one of the things that literally no one agrees on, on this damned ship and for everythin' you said at Reid's meetin', I wanted to know if you follow through with that opinion when its your own inmate in the shit. I assumed you did something but the scale of 'something' seems to be different for everyone.

You're pissed about how I started it - fine. I apologize for my openin' tone. But I'm not gonna apologize for askin' the damn question.

[abrightboy]

I don't want you to. I don't even want you to apologize for your tone; mine quickly became as out of line as yours was. Let's call it even. I just want to be treated like a professional that is here for a reason, okay? And it's less on you than on a lot of other people. It's almost never on you; you just surprised me. Especially since I wanted to come to you about... a personal problem. It's... a bigger problem than that, is the thing. You don't understand. And then I didn't want it to make you think I'm even less capable. Remember.... [He stills, watching Raylan's face for a moment, watching for an indication as to whether that is what will happen.]

[tinstar]

[It all seemed to appease Raylan, some of the intensity in his eyes and the set of his jaw easing and relaxing.]

Only thing that's gonna make me think you're less than capable is if you prove by inaction that you're less than capable.

Do I remember what?

[abrightboy]

[Malcolm is still watching but when Raylan's body language eases, his mirrors it.]

Do you remember when we talked about the werewolves?

[tinstar]

[His brow furrows a little in confusion.]

Yeah... [What did that have to do with capability?]

[abrightboy]

Lark told me there would be some increased emotionality after the change. I told him one of my misgivings was that I already have... easily piqued emotions.

[tinstar]

[His weight shifts, one hand propping on the counter.]

Is this you tellin' me that it's already done or that you're worried about snappin' on people on board once it is?

[abrightboy]

He did it a few days ago and he was supposed to help me with... things. But. He's gone.

[tinstar]

[Raylan's eyes widen a bit, head extending forwards at the neck, like he was angling to hear better because surely, he'd heard wrong. Malcolm had done it. Malcolm had decided to join a pack that was - what? Was it even a pack? He felt like a chasm opened up. He felt betrayed, though he knew he had no right to that, and he felt oh so sharply alone again.

Biting back the worst of what was clattering around behind his teeth, Raylan drops his eyes to the safer view of the countertop before closing them and taking a deep breath, free hand pinching at the top of his nose for a long second before it drops.]

Of course he is. Of course you are. [He swears to god, the next time he sees Lark Tennet here.]

So what do you wanna do. Do you wanna go to the Admiral to see if it can be reversed or-

[abrightboy]

No. I want you to help me.

[tinstar]

How, Malcolm? How do I help?

I mean I'm the one person on board who seems to know literally the least about this; I know Iris is a wolf, she- [Would be Better at Helping him then Raylan ever could. He sighs and empties his glass down his throat, bearing his teeth slightly as he swallows it down.]

I'm only good at a few things and fosterin' the growth and control of whatever the hell this is gonna bring you isn't one of them. [He wanted to help, of course he did. He just didn't know how or where to even begin. Doubly so when he thought this was a bad idea in the first place.]

[abrightboy]

Iris is... fine. She's nice. But I don't really know her. You're my family.

[tinstar]

[Raylan stares at Malcolm for a long moment, heart twisting in time with his stomach doing the same. God he wanted family. He wanted the brotherhood that they had forged, he wanted it but Malcolm had thrown 'I thought we were friends' at him like they weren't in the middle of a fight and he can't help but worry that's how Malcolm actually feels.

But they had called it even. He takes and lets another deep breath and glances over towards his bottle, feeling self conscious about pouring another one. It could hold until Malcolm left.]

Okay. [The rest of the fight slips out of him.] I don't know even know where to begin, but- [He'll help. Whatever that ends up looking like.] Can you tell me why? Why you wanted this.. transformation? What you're gettin' out of it?

[abrightboy]

Lark said being in the pack meant having a connection to the others. A... a bond. Plus it would help with my work because I'd have sharper senses and be faster and stronger.

[tinstar]

[A bond, a connection. And then Lark's gone, leaving Malcolm without what he promised. Goddamnit. He hated people who did this kind of shit.

Raylan can only shake his head a little and stare at the counter for a minute.]

I don't understand why you feel you need those things from them, but if you're stickin' with it..

That mean you want me steppin' in and drawin' your attention to your.. heightened emotions? And what if somethin' happens and you.. I dunno, flip out, go wolf and decide to try and tear someone's throat out?