goneawaycomms | Counselor Aiden Price

[Even after talking to Bunny, even after deciding that the best thing to do is confront his avoidant tendencies and reconnect with Price, Dan drags his feet. And then, about a week into dragging his feet, he gets tossed into another Jorgmund mission, and as such it's at least a month since they slept together that he actually tries to find Price.

The last time he was at this dorm, he was putting his clothes back on.]

Hey. [Dan figures he owes Price an apology, which makes this an inverse of the last time he approached Price in his room.]

[Price has been keeping himself busy mostly with chores and lasering whatever abomination made of Stuff they tasked him to eliminate, without really speaking to anyone in the process. Sure, he had one conversation with Stacia, but that's all. When Dan enters his room, he's dusting it quite idly.]

Oh. [He's glad to speak to someone, but he's also tired and already anticipating having to walk on eggshells to spare himself from further unbearable trouble.] Hello, Daniel.

[Dan wasn't expecting Price to welcome him with open arms or enthusiasm, so the bland reception doesn't throw him. He stays outside the doorway.]

Do you got ten minutes or so to talk? We could take a walk up on the roof, dodge some giant butterflies.

Sure.

[He mumbles the answer. Despite missing Dan a little bit, he wasn't exactly looking forward to interacting with him. He still kind of hides behind him on the way to the roof.]

[Dan lets Price have the quiet as they head up to the roof, and he feels a moment of disappointment when he sees that there are no giant butterflies out today to spice things up. Just the monotonous landscape of the Gone Away World and conversation to fill the air.]

I owe you an apology. I got a tendency to, you know. Not stick around for breakfast when I stay the night with someone. It wasn't you.

[Apparently by 'breakfast' Dan means a whole month. Not that Price can complain.]

Alright.

[He pauses, wondering whether he should stay quiet or let out some of the anger.]

You know, you don't have to apologize if you don't want to.

[For an overly empathetic person, Dan sure made the decision to apologize to Price only to contain whatever bad action he expects from him.]

I know I don't. I want to apologize because you deserve to hear that it was wrong of me to treat you like that. [Dan has a tendency to chew on his fingers when he's anxious about something, particularly when, like this morning, he doesn't have cigarettes at his disposal to satisfy his oral fixation. That's what he does now, absentmindedly biting his knuckle as he looks out at the horizon.]

I ain't used to being stuck somewhere and seeing the same faces over and over again. I reckon it made it easier for me to not think about the fact that I was treating people unkind when I just up and disappeared on them.

You have one-night stands with people on the Rig all the time. Do you apologize to others too?

[He's almost looking forward to the lies about how this is different.]

Edited 2021-08-25 07:10 (UTC)

Sometimes. [And that's the truth, although Dan doesn't apologize often. He apologizes when people confront him. This is a special case, borne from Dan's suspicion that Price still has no one else to give him a lick of kindness on this Rig. The other hires have been alienated, and corporate just sees another warm body to turn a profit.]

Besides, no day like today to be a better person.

I'm sorry, I don't understand what the problem is.

[He barely resist the urge to roll his eyes. Is Dan even apologizing for avoiding him or for 'giving him false hopes'?]

[Dan wants to go "well, if you accept my apology, that's great, water under the bridge", but he's aware by now that Price is infinitely more complicated than the simple, almost childish responses he so often gives people.

He expects it'll bite him in the ass later if he doesn't do right now. Maybe it'll bite him in the ass anyway.]

The problem's just that ghosting a person like that is rude at best. Sometimes it makes people reckon it's their fault instead of mine. So I wanted to apologize for avoiding you, because no matter what way you feel about it, I'm aware enough to know it was rude.

[Price has never counted as a person. Whether Dan is acting like he does because he wants to protect his friends or because he actually believes that Price deserves respect because somehow he still hasn't grasped how it all works (stupid Dan) it doesn't really matter.]

People are rude to me all the time. [he shrugs] I'm used to it.

I don't care if you're used to it. [There's a certain amount of frustration that leaks into Dan's tone, because he isn't sure why his own efforts to treat Price like a person - or at least demonstrate that it matters to him to treat Price like a person - never seem to be taken in sincerity.]

[Price clenches his fists.]

I'm sorry, did you think I was going to fall in love with you? That you are so special that you could change something I am biologically incapable of doing? While I am not as trashy as you are about it, I have had my fair share of hook ups as well. I know how it works.

Besides, I did not really want to have sex with you, I just thought I could focus on how good you looked since you were pressuring me anyway. You wanted to vent about Stacia, and I wanted to listen, that was the evening I had signed up for, but you cannot say no to the one person that doesn't threaten you and hit you and tell you that you deserve to die, can you?

[Oh, he absolutely did want it, but that's not the real meaning of his rant. At this point the fact that Dan treated him as something worth having sex with offends him, the pretty face and the manipulation skills have all crumbled. There's nothing left, he's just a useless old man who spent his entire life being mistreated, without the beauty or the brain to compensate for it, to make it bearable. Why wouldn't he be constantly enraged, even more than he already was?]

You're just here because you had the audacity to think that you... [he grimaces] Broke my heart, and you are afraid that you or friends will suffer the consequences.

Edited 2021-08-26 07:06 (UTC)

[Dan bites down on his knuckle as Price lashes out at him, which, if this were his first time trying to navigate the stormy seas of Price's moods with him, might catch him off guard. As it is, the only thing that surprises Dan is some of the content of Price's vitriol, not the presence of vitriol itself. He tries to think back on the night they slept together, which has holes in it because - well, most of Dan's nights have holes in them.

He can't remember Price seeming pressured, just generally nervous, dropping vodka on the floor, and Dan remembers using his power at some point and not getting any sense of resistance, but maybe it's possible, between Dan's drinking and Price's reticence to stand up for himself except by being vindictive, that Dan hurt him.

He lets go of his knuckle before he responds, wipes his hand on his coveralls.]

That's not why I'm here. I ain't scared of you, and I know you ain't in love with me. [Dan almost stoops to think that Price is incapable, but no - he remembers the all-consuming, possessive, hopeless devotion with which Price talked about the Director, a kind of love that seemed radioactive and awful but was love nonetheless.

Gently, sincerely:] Did I really make you feel pressured?

Edited 2021-08-26 07:31 (UTC)

Then why are you here? Why do you care?

[He feels deeply unsettled at the question. People just don't care if they hurt him or not, not when they know the real him.]

A little bit. I thought you were going to be disappointed or mad at me if I rejected you.

I'm here because I don't like hurting folks.

[Dan feels his heart sink, feels suddenly almost dizzy with the idea that, through his lack of sensitivity or his drunkenness or some other factor, he didn't pick up on the fact that Price was feeling that way. He would have stopped if he'd had any idea, but rosy hypotheticals are a cold comfort when someone's been hurt.]

I'm so sorry. [He can't wrap his head around Price worried that he'd get angry at a rejection, when Dan's never shown anything harsher than exasperation to Price, never raised his voice, never said something cruel just to vent it, but it doesn't matter.] I didn't know. I'm sorry.

[Price doesn't know what to say. He averts Dan's glance.]

Is that all?

Do you want it to be? [Dan takes a deep breath.] Because I'd get if you didn't want to see me again. I'd respect it.

Of course I want to see you again. It's just that there is no way it can possibly go well.

[He told Dan many times that he should give up on him for his own good, anyway.]

[Dan, whose ability to calmly track what's happening in a conversation and what motivations someone has is often unparalleled, feels his head spinning with all the mixed messages he's getting.]

What is it that you think is going to happen that's so bad?

Edited 2021-08-26 18:04 (UTC)

[He thinks about it for a moment since vaguely gesturing to himself isn't enough of an explanation for Dan.]

I will make you hurt yourself somehow. You won't mind, but your friends will and problems are going to rise between you and them. Who knows what can develop from that...

[Dan makes a sound that would be a laugh if he were thinking about anything actually funny.] I don't need your help to hurt myself, Counselor.

[What does Price think Dan's doing with all the alcohol, the drugs, the hookups, the running straight into danger? Does Price think Dan's prepping his body for a good long life of leisure and health?

Because what Price has offered isn't an explanation.]

Oh, I'm well aware of it, Daniel. However I am also aware that it's the very reason why you slept with me in the first place. We both knew you were going to regret it. You can act like you're just sorry for avoiding me afterwards, but it is obvious that you only did it because you wanted to make a mistake.

[And what's depressing is that being your mistake is the max I can aspire to, he'd like to add, but he still has a bit of pride left.]

Edited 2021-08-26 20:12 (UTC)

[And there it is - Price nailing on the head Dan's worst tendency, his habit of roping other people into his self-abuse, of using them as tools to distract him from himself instead of treating them like people the way he preaches, the way he wishes he were able to always treat everyone.

He shrugs with an apologetic half-smile]

Well, you're also attractive and I was horny.

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