Spaghetti and Meatballs

Posted on Tue Mar 15th, 2022 @ 2:30am by Evahnae Kohl & Ships Doctor Hiram Maitland M.D.
Edited on on Tue Mar 15th, 2022 @ 3:43am

Mission: Mission 14: Holoworld
Location: Hiram's Quarters
Timeline: Middle of the night, probably.
11362 words - 22.7 OF Standard Post Measure

"Hey."

It was, without a doubt, a very understated greeting given the hour and the potential intrusion. What made it even more ridiculous, if such a thing was fair to say given the circumstance, was that the single syllable of nonchalance offered no explanation whatsoever for the general state of disarray, of desperation, of the rather furtive nocturnal visitor. By now, it was reasonable to suppose that Eva didn't really suffer a great deal of consternation about whether or not she was welcome before inserting herself into situations. At the very least, she hadn't shown hesitation in that regard where her friend was concerned, having literally launched herself across counters to spend time in his company. When occupied by the mundane task of trying to fit in, Eva was impulsive and impetuous and not the kind of person to look immediately apologetic for existing. Part of it might have been a ruse, considered a little superficial because it served the purpose of keeping people at arm's length, but at some point credit had to be given for the sheer amount of self-confidence it took to be bold even as a defensive tactic. It didn't usually leave a lot of room for looking meek.

She'd been crying; recently enough that she was still snuffling once in a while.

"Computer said you were awake, though not sure if it knows how to tell so you can kick me if I woke you up."

And it wasn't that often that the brunette looked as tiny as she actually was. In a move that was poignantly reminiscent of a recent date-gone-wrong, she was swaddled in a blanket; a brightly-coloured patchwork affair that seemed well-travelled, and the frazzled halo of hair that hung loosely to mid-back gave the impression that she'd come directly from an attempt at sleep, which was entirely accurate. The slightest squint of her left eye suggested Eva hadn't successfully roused, though the slight pucker of her brow hinted at some discomfort as an additional cause.

"I need you to slap me and tell me to stop being stupid."

It took her a moment to meet his eyes, struggling with the attempt to focus as well as her own sense of awkwardness. Stubbornly self-sufficient; the hallmark of her entire life. Strongly suspected by those closest to her to be allergic to asking for help. It was costing her something to stand there but vulnerability, once exposed, at least became something that didn't need to be explained again, or denied quite so vehemently. For all the reasons Hiram had become the first person in a very long time that Eva had confided anything in, he remained someone she trusted with this. This barely-successful attempt to keep her shit together.

She sniffed at him. "I really am sorry if I woke you up."

If one thing could be counted on aboard the Mary Rose it was the ship's doctor. In more ways than one, perhaps; most found reliability a strong trait in Dr. Maitland more than approachability or sociality, but much as one could set their watch by the dimming of lights in the corridors that signified night-time aboard a spacefaring vessel, they could equally be certain that Hiram Maitland would be awake at 0400.

Hiram didn't profess to much in the way of stress, or anxiety, but a body calibrated to higher levels of cortisol and adrenaline occurred whether or not he emotionally resonated with it-anxiety knew no discrimination in that regard, and what it meant was that ultimately the periods of time when most people were surely to be exhausted, in the dead of REM, were the periods of time Hiram spent amped up on the couch watching an infomercial on Slap Chop, fuzzing the line between hypervigilant and zoned the fuck out.

In short, he was an insomniac, a bad one, and when he was sleeping, he physiologically struggled with apnea as a result of his condition. Normally he used a component tied into the Synapse to breathe correctly during somnolence, but with the pair broken, he'd had to rely on an old standard, the BiPAP, which was bulky and noisy and not conducive at all to sleep. Which meant that even if Hiram were somehow tired, he probably wouldn't have been inclined either way.

Eva's assumptions of her friend's wakefulness could not be more accurate, and the door opened almost as soon as she rang the chime, to Hiram in a T-shirt, exposing the tattoo of one arm along with the three lines and dot clusters of the other; presumably it was an identification of some kind but he hadn't explained that one-given what he'd already shared, their purpose seemed more or less evident. It was a rank, of some kind, and un-dissolvable by Federation technology. His hair was a tad messier than normal as though he'd ran his fingers through it a couple of times, but he offered her a smile and stepped aside to let her in.

Most would expect Hiram's quarters to be spartan, but those who knew him better, knew that he preferred to cultivate a sense of normalcy in his dealings, and the dude who slept in a hotel room for a house usually got side-eyed. Hiram had some belongings which were half-unpacked, a drumset in the corner of the living area, a television with a gaming console, a paintball gun and canisters on a bookshelf overflowing with old medical and pharmaceutical texts, some paintings that did look like they were out of a hotel, and a few assorted pictures.

She'd seen the one in his office of Rael and himself outside the Palais, but there were also ones of himself and his parents, a few college souvenirs, one of him and his internship team at FORPATH, and some function or another where medical students (cadets, by the look of the uniform) were expected to dress up-and one of him in a commissioned officer's Starfleet uniform captioned USS Navir.

"Think nothing of it, I was already awake," he said, alarm-clock predictable. "I will not slap you, but I will make you some tea." It was a habit he'd picked up from Rael; Vulcan politeness usually dictated a visitor begin a pot when entering another person's domicile, and he'd developed a taste for a specific Vulcan blend that was reminiscent of licorice spice-the root, not the candy. It was sweet, and mild. And herbal, since he doubted Eva needed a fresh injection of nerves.

Curiosity, even in the midst of her own struggles with restfulness, allowed for momentary distraction and also gave Eva space to drag her gaze upwards from the defeat of glaring at the floor to build an instant snapshot. A substantial component of her eventual permission to seek him out had stemmed from a desire to maintain the momentum they'd already established. Eva didn't often allow herself to connect quickly, certainly not on such a confidential level, but it helped knowing that being intentional was something that actually helped Hiram. Intentional, blunt, straight to the point...

"Tea is a start," she agreed quietly, eyes lingering a moment on the photo with his family before spreading out her arms to reposition her blanket and then shrouding herself in it. One day, when she made him watch all the Star Wars movies in the correct order, (order of release, chronology be damned), perhaps there'd be greater appreciation for her Jawa impression. For now, Eva stood awkwardly, still not fully within herself to take liberties with making herself at home.

Except, it was immediately the sensation she felt, or at least something akin to it. The space around Hiram, and Eva couldn't account for it logically other than obvious neurological uniqueness, exuded a calm control that made it seem almost possible that her spiral could have a different outcome to the one she was currently pacing the ship in the hopes of avoiding. For the first time in over an hour or two, the telepath felt like she could breathe and she did so, several shaky breaths inwards culminating in an eventual sigh that saw her choose a wall to lean against in order to watch him.

"I was going to call ahead, but then I thought that would wake you up for sure." Beneath the makeshift hood, Eva grimaced at the sheer amount of mess tumbling out of her mouth. "So I took a nosedive towards Crazytown and walked here instead. Like, the long way." A huff of self-depreciating laughter was further relaxation. At least the crew were still mostly still too involved in Gregnol's insanity to pay too much heed to a wandering bartender and her patchwork train. It probably spoke a lot to Eva's initial impact that most who had noticed her didn't really find her appearance that odd.

Hiram's eyes had taken her in, their metronomic swing a back-and-forth that made it difficult to track what it was he did look at on a regular basis as it gave the impression of constantly tracking about the room, somewhat manically, but Eva had long become accustomed to it; and to him, in general. It was part of why her friendship had become a necessary staple of his tenure aboard the Mary Rose, having expected to spend a majority of his time masking, it was pleasant to-as Eva put it, breathe a little. It was a synchronicity that was not lost on him. His mind, for all its fuzz, offering a refuge that encouraged acceptance in return.

He moved to the kitchen in a gliding, silent movement (Hiram never, to Eva's knowledge, made noise when walking-something that had routinely frustrated everyone who spent extended time with him as at any moment, a wandering Hiram could pop up out of nowhere and scare the living shit out of people-) and began boiling water in an old-fashioned kettle. (It was bright yellow, as were a majority of his kitchen appliances, contrasted with greens and earthy tones that indicated less an appreciation for art deco and more just things Hiram had picked because he liked them, at random.)

"You are always welcome to call, or to show up however you'd like," he assured her with a smile given over the countertop separating the kitchen from the living area, indicating with his chin that she was more than welcome to burrow into the couch he'd been slouched in prior to her arrival. The television was still blaring its tenacious infomercials, this time the product was an egg slicer that sliced eggs perfectly every time, just in case you, y'know. Needed that.

You know Hiram was gonna buy it. Judging by all the other random nonsense in his quarters, this was a very real possibility.

There was very little hesitation in Eva's reaction, pushing immediately away from the wall to retreat to the couch as if that simple invitation was an utter imperative she craved. It wasn't far from the truth, though it often represented a vulnerability that she hadn't always managed well; that need to have someone else make decisions for her, to spin her around and point her in a direction because her internal compass was all sorts of haywire and only dictating a pathway straight down. She sank into one of the corner cushions, bleary eyes fixated vacantly on the television screen as the absolute redundancy of the gadget evoked a similar reaction from Eva that Hiram obviously encountered. Fascination. The allure, in her case, that suggested this was exactly what was missing from her repertoire and, thus, might represent the entire reason that she couldn't really cook. Badly sliced eggs. It all made sense!

Legs pulled up so that her entire body fit beneath her blanket, Eva welcomed the distraction and became instantly absorbed.

It took Hiram a few more moments to finish off the tea, pouring boiling water carefully into two mugs-one a hand-painted clay monstrosity that declared itself Brain Dead Mon-Fri 9am-5pm and another with a bunch of neatly drawn amino acid structures on it, and he brought them over to the couch and nudged himself down alongside Eva, holding one out. There wasn't an immediate request for clarity, because perhaps more than anyone aboard, absent an actual telepath, Hiram did instinctively understand the purpose for her visit beyond its surface. "Oh, I see you've met the Egg Slicer," he laughed lightly, raising his glass to his lips. She got the Brain Dead one, because, lulz.

"Not yet, but I definitely need to. God, those slices are so symmetrical."

Which was just pleasing. Satisfying. Easy to fixate on. Patterns and sequences, repetition. It would have been more soothing had she not already a headache. Eva's first sip of tea was tentative, since it seemed about as scorching hot as effective medicinal brews were required to be, and then she took a moment to pull back and read the mug before pulling a face at him. Wry. Thankful. It was much easier to find her way back to herself when he started out being unfunny.

Bunching up her blanket some so that she could rest her mug on her knee, Eva stared at the television from her patchwork cave and ignored the fact that curling up into such a confined space was adding a dull ache from her recently-repaired midriff to her catalogue. "I can't even think of one time when I even needed to cut egg. How do they come up with these things?"

Excuse you, Hiram is the funniest. "They're very soothing," he huffed softly, and sitting beside her, his posture was imminently formal, straight-backed with his legs apart just enough for him to rest his elbows along his knees, mug clutched in hand. Sitting so close to him, and observing him, it was obvious perhaps more to Evahnae (to him, she often was, in his formal tones that could really only be tolerated from Hiram himself) than anyone else that Hiram contended with a good deal of tension that rested along the sharp edges of his shoulders and bunched into his neck. He wasn't a very good relaxer even though he attempted, diligently, to portray himself as lighthearted and easy-going. "I am thinking we can corner the market on the egg-slicer for one's brain," he indicated her mug with a little grin.

"Oh god, don't tempt me."

It was a micro-step closer to any sort of revelation for her arrival, and her current state, but as much as Eva had presented as being thoroughly at her wit's end, drenched in desperation and the plaintive fragility of having reached her capacity to deal with things on her own, she didn't seem in a great hurry to explain what those things might be. Instead, she sipped at her tea, furrowed her brow at the television and wriggled her toes against the very edge of the cushion. "Too mushy," she declared after a moment's silence, just long enough for the response to sound slightly ludicrous. "Slicing my brain would be like trying to cut a tomato with a chopstick."

"Not an impossible task," Hiram insisted optimistically, able to navigate the spaces in between her words with only the barest crease to the edges of his eyes that indicated some measure of intuitive comprehension that wasn't always evident with Hiram-sometimes he missed signals, but in this, he had a better baseline. He recognized suffering when it happened in front of him, despite one's noble attempts at shrugging it off and marching forward, and he acted as he had attempted to act since graduating Northside and emerging into adulthood as his own individual self: as a balm. A measure of ease. The product of his own sense of intellectual morals. Somewhere he'd gotten it into his mind that suffering was irrational, and that had formed the basis of his ability to act prosocially. He was a physician, first. Whether this was addressed verbally or not. He didn't push, he merely made space. Mentally, and now within the walls that had become his home. "We could always freeze the tomato." Hiram was a problem-solver.

"You know, I had not considered cryogenics as a treatment option. When do we start?"

The invitation, the absurd acceptance, was punctuated by a flick across-ways with the corner of her blanket, which flapped impotently against his leg but at least served as retaliation of sorts. It also presented as Eva's grudging acknowledgement of the distance between them, more a lack of information than physical separation, as well as simply resembling a very typical tendency on her part to employ mockeries of violence in her affectionate repertoire. "Stop being so reasonable." He really wasn't; frozen tomato-brain slicers fit no preexisting framework for reasonable. "Why are you awake anyway?" The query saw the brunette turn her head, her attention finally affixing itself to him to allow her to study his face. As it happened, the shift in concern away from herself for a second actually felt like a relief.

"I prefer to watch my entertainment live," Hiram joked, eyebrows bouncing a little, but he settled very slightly as he contemplated a further answer both serious and non-impactful. "Insomnia," he tapped his own chest, his expression purposefully rueful, only slightly approaching the uncanny valley enough for Eva to recognize it as such. "A lifelong affliction, I'm afraid." One he was certain Eva might be very familiar with, at least aboard the ship; they'd encountered one another quite-often wandering hallways, observation decks, the galley, the bar... it had been unspoken, and now was spoken, though the revelation was hardly monumental-guessable, Hiram's repertoire mostly-was.

"Well, yeah." It had been a stupid question really, one that had uncharacteristically not been exactly the one Eva had meant to ask. Tiny little fractures, the way her glue just wasn't sticking her pieces back together as well as it usually did. She frowned and tried again. "Are you okay though?" Despite plenty of time to have rectified the cosmetic infraction, Eva's eyes were as dark as any full-blooded Betazoid, and despite the fact that the ends of her long tresses were still a rich burgundy, the rather timely effect was a masterful disguise of anything that hinted at less-than-total inheritance. Unless she intentionally stepped in to alter pigmentation as her whims desired, Eva wore all her imperfections on the inside. That black gaze scrutinised now, a rather futile scrabble to dig beneath the nuances of expression to find any hint of suffering for herself. It was mostly a pointless endeavour, of course; for all the reasons Hiram made it easier to breathe, he was also an impossible study based on empathy and intuition alone. It was why the sledgehammer of direct interrogation was so much more efficient. "With your thingamy broken, I just wondered..."

"I do have a back-up device," Hiram nodded, lips twitching in a fond maneuver. His own eyes met hers, watching her watch him, the imprints of red that streaked her sclera alerting him to her prior time spent in tears; at some point recently, alongside the darkened circles and swaddled blankets. Comparatively, Hiram was indomitable, but it could not be ignored that he had allowed this experience as an opportunity to share a part of himself that he had worked for years to masterfully hide from those around him. One could contend that Hiram was unaffected entirely. Almost. His shoulders straightened out even further and he sat back, leaning somewhat on the palm of his free hand where it dug into his knee. "I am OK," he assured her. "Did you know that one of our medics is an xB?" he used their colloquial term, the one they used amongst themselves, rather than the standard appellation.

Her eyes dug at him a moment longer, perhaps for the full stretch of time it took for her mushy, not-at-all-frozen brain to properly engage in the rather severe change of topic. Eva's sluggish uptake might have been forgiven; the fact that she wasn't asleep didn't seem to marry with her very evident need for it, but there was also just the very blatant and simple fact that she needed to make sure he was actually fine. Of all the pieces of shattered glass that had been trailing behind her all night, a sudden aching concern for her friend had simply become the most immediately addressable. He was confusing her now, though, once she actually process his question and frowned. "You mean Oliver? Yeah, he told me. After the holodeck thing, he came to the bar." Briefly, Eva's expression softened to a fond smile, albeit quite a small one. "I let him beat me at poker."

"You allowed me to best you at poker, as well," Hiram snorted a little, gaze slightly unfocused in that way he got when he was thinking of how best to formulate a complicated, interlocking thought. With Hiram they came nuanced and layered, each individual concept a thin film-strip overlaid on microscopic slides with blooms of color that periodically splashed forward, and then receded into the fuzz and loam. The desert soil, tilled and cracked, the heat of the sun and crackling fire, the damp warmth of soothing caverns and the hum and rush, flying. Flying. It was a gentle imagery, reminiscent of her friend, with the agitation of electricity that crackled in Hiram's chest. He didn't even twitch at it, a bare flicker. "Some of the crew are wary of him. I am pleased you are not among their numbers."

She was exhausted, agitated and in pain, and yet some part of Eva flicked on just enough to catch the ebb. Perhaps not enough for a direct correlation but she had built herself over the years as a monolith, all 5'3" inches of her, capable of standing firm whilst the experiences and frustrations and insecurities of every patron who walked through her door eventually ended up in puddles that required either a mop or a tissue to clean up. And her head might have been a mess but she did have an innate ability to read others, and though Hiram was undoubtedly the greatest challenge in that regard so far, Eva had enough of a creative soul for her imagination to fill in gaps. Empathy wasn't just about being able to delve into the grime of another person's emotional reality; sometimes it was just seeing a situation for what it was and finding it within yourself to understand the other person's experience with it.

She smiled faintly at him.

"I've met a couple across the years. I think, when you work for as long as I have in the industry, it's kind of inevitable. It's not that unusual for people who feel like they have nowhere else to belong to turn up places where they at least get to watch other people. Oliver seems like he's trying to rebuild though. I volunteered you for some formal training for him, by the way." A familiar mischief flared, unthwarted by personal overload to remain distant for too long. "Or at least I suggested he ask you, since you're probably useful for something."

"Indeed," Hiram's lips pressed together as he nodded. "He was enthusiastic about it when I initially offered, I'm pleased he is still interested. My goal is to ultimately have most of the crew familiar with basic first aid, and the medical staff able to handle diagnostics and treatment within..." Hiram trailed off, abruptly, shaking his head, realizing he was losing the track. He waved a hand, palm-up, in an unusual gesture before leaning his weight against his palm once more.

"I am all right," he murmured at long last, letting whatever had cropped up momentarily pass him by; given the state of his friend he didn't feel it appropriate to lay it on her, or really on anyone, but that was a tomato-potato scenario of its own. At least for now, he buckled it up, falling back on years and years of remote conditioning to level through the stress. "You shall have to show me your winning hand." His eyes dragged up to meet hers, a slow and steady flicker.

Narrowed eyes. Suspicion. Dissection. For all she exerted a great deal of effort in making it difficult for the galaxy to identify her Betazoid heritage, Eva had a very niche way of being entirely reliant on it when it suited her to function on a no-holds-barred level. This was what it meant to be her friend, to be counted amongst those she didn't wear a mask in front of, and right now, the machinations of a very tired brain were struggling to slot together all the pieces of information Eva was picking up from their exchange, including the parts her imagination was responsible for.

"Wait, what did you just do?"

Three-quarters of a mug of tea was pointed at him, accusingly, before she turned her entire body around to sit cross-legged, facing him.

"See, this is where you drive me bonkers. Very short trip, but no excuse. You just did something." The imputation, the partial hilarity that she had absolutely no idea what was transpiring in his beautifully unique mind because whatever frequency he operated on was not one she'd learned to navigate in the slightest. "Where you probably were making a point about something but stopped halfway and I don't know if you just expected me to pick up on something but, my dear Dr. Strange, I have an absolute trash heap for a brain right now. You're going to have to draw me the whole picture."

"I do not drive you bonkers," Hiram focused on the most important part of that statement with an exaggerated bounce of his eyebrows. His expression cleared a few moments later, settling into the eerie, unmoving neutrality that she'd come to slowly recognize over the last little while as his equivalent of lowered defenses. It wasn't a side of him that others typically saw, eyes calculating and icy calm, vivid blue to match the frost. "My equilibrium is somewhat disturbed," he admitted with a careful huff, never taking his gaze off of hers. His voice took on a much more monotone quality, and looking at him across from her, it became evident very suddenly, that she was looking at someone she didn't recognize. The accoutrements, for a split-second, were gone. For only a very, very brief moment, and when he spoke again, it was with intentional warmth. "You were nearly killed. Here. Today. My concerns are merely remnants. You needn't worry."

To her credit, which Eva wasn't not always the best at giving herself, she didn't rush in immediately to placate or dismiss. When it came to deeper, more intentional levels of connecting with people, she was not always as proficient as her very persuasive bar-side manner would have outsiders believe, and though her overwhelming sentiment currently was to fold herself into the comfort of Hiram's psionic nullification, Eva had spent enough of her infernal waking hours contemplating his situation to hesitate for a moment out of respect, if nothing else, for his change in demeanour. New information, new awareness, anything about him that added to the narrative, was catalogued by the glittering intent of a very intense stare that betrayed elements of Eva's own neuro-divergence. Sifting through his behaviour to find the patterns, and it wasn't that it wasn't disconcerting on some levels. She could hardly profess to have the intuitive capacity she did and not respond to the void sitting across from her with some trepidation. But it wasn't enough to translate into fear and, once processed, presented more as a compulsion to bridge the distance it created. It was the same open-heartedness that had been with her from a very young age, which had occasionally lead to naivety and a desire to save the wounded at the expense of her own well-being. Time and too many mistakes had closed her off, left her unwilling to be as available and accessible because a soul could only toss itself into a minefield so many times, but she had preserved just enough and shaped it into a career. To the unobservant, she was just a bartender. To those who knew better, Eva had the capacity to be a refuge.

Which was why there was no part of her that felt any urge to turn away from him. Quite the opposite, Eva wriggled forward until she was close enough for her knees to touch him, and reached out her free hand, the one not currently trying to balance her tea, to take his and guide it to her injury site. "See this? It's fine now because you made it fine." Lifting her hand from his, Eva tapped her fingertips to her temple. "And this goes around in circles all the time, so if we're going to wait for it to get its shit together, we'll be a long time twiddling our thumbs. I came here because..."

Her tone tapered off, the words requiring a moment's consideration to ensure accuracy. Eva sighed. "A lot of reasons. Couldn't sleep, had a headache, decided to dwell on things that never do me any good. Was half a corridor away from just drinking myself into oblivion but I told myself I'd...check on you first." Eva hunched a shoulder at that, an uncharacteristic display of self-consciousness. "Things keep coming back, bits and pieces I didn't remember. About the...attack. I remember...it...now."

Previously, the distinction between the hologram and Hiram had been a muddle in her head and, though Eva had fought a thousand demons to keep that from being an issue, it had been responsible for dredging up old memories. Of people apparently on her side who had lashed out and left marks and told her they loved her whilst blaming her for every bruise they inflicted. Logically, rationally, she couldn't blame Hiram for what had happened but it had been hard, when her only recollection didn't separate the two representations of him properly. Now, she had a clearer picture. "Which is frankly, kind of a relief, but also has just made me realise how much this has been an attack on you too. So I will worry, because I'm not selfish enough to think this is just about me."

Hiram wasn't accustomed to being touched, but Eva was more than anyone a person quite confidently able to breach that vast, cataclysmic distance between Hiram's upright statuesque posture and what passed for an actual human being (or thereabouts). It might have come as a surprise that he was warm, that his skin wasn't ice cold the way his expression could very waveringly veer into. Just ordinary. He let her guide his hand to her side, his fingers brushing the fabric of her shirt in a clinical, practiced manner as though testing for tenderness, head drifted briefly to the side in the distracting haze of medicine-to-be-practiced.

And there was, even if it wasn't so evident. Her words evoked a small smile from him. Not their contents, but-"I am glad. That you elected to seek me out, instead of pursuing less favorable activities." He needed her to know that. It was important for her to know that, that she could come here. That he would be willing to talk with her, or not, at her discretion. When his hand was released, fingers settled against his own knee once more, index tapping once as he attempted to coalesce. "I regret, deeply, that you recall my countenance assaulting you, and that there is little I can say to alleviate this experience for you."

There was the very faintest crease of his eyebrows, a flinch of his bearing that could be attributable to a glitch of exhaustion rather than originating from Hiram himself. "If an apology from me would be meaningful, consider it done. I did not directly harm you, but I was negligent in my awareness, and that resulted in this situation. I bear the responsibility." Hiram straightened up a little. There was a sense of suffocation in the air, a humidity that snaked into a person's lungs. The acrid, arid desert turned to toxic, tar-pit betrayal.

He assigned the blame to himself. And it was such a confident, unwavering acknowledgment of his own lapse in judgment that it was difficult to contest; a fact he was relaying and not an individualistic interpretation of his environment-what one might otherwise term an emotional reaction, if one were not Hiram Maitland. "Watching-" his head shook, a sudden jerk, all of a sudden, and he cleared his throat, smiling instead. "Please, let me know if there is anything I can do to make this easier for you."

"Hiram."

The way her chin sank towards her chest, the slump of her shoulders beneath her ridiculous frayed patchwork blanket, the way she diminished in the single exhalation it took to breathe out some of her frustration; Eva was tired. More than that, she was fed up with being exhausted and in turmoil. A quiet shake of her head dismissed his efforts anyway, because if this was a contest between observable facts and a single telepath's stubbornness, Eva had news for his summary of events.

Nevertheless, she took a moment to choose her words carefully.

"We were both attacked." It was a gentle start, rich with sadness and grief, but ultimately, understanding. Empathy. There it was again. Lifting her chin, Eva sought his gaze intentionally, leaning forward to make sure she held it. "And what it did to you was nothing short of cruel. It's important to me that I've remembered it that way, that's why I'm glad the memories fell into place even if they are painful. Please don't blame yourself. That thing had the advantage from the start, you could have been right next to me and the same thing might have happened." Eva watched him intently for a moment, the unwavering pierce of her gaze endeavouring to forge a tunnel that shoved her certainty right into the centre of his core. "This happened to you as much as it happened to me and you don't have to be okay with it for my sake."

At that, though, his head shook. "I am not OK with it," he corrected her, gentle. It was not an admission that he made lightly, or easily, but it was important to him that she knew it was true. "Perhaps this would better be a conversation held with a professional," he huffed a bit, self-deprecating. "But as I happen to be the only physician on board, it's quite meaningless, hm?" Humor, all the same. "I am not OK with it. I watched myself perpetrate acts of violence against someone who I care for. I acted violently in turn on my own impetus. That has had ramifications for you, potentially permanent ones, and it has created in me an instability that I find exceptionally challenging to navigate." He was speaking somewhat forcefully, each word a kind of pressured staccato that highlighted the effort it took to actually verbalize.

In an odd juxtaposition, as every crack in the clay brought her friend closer to an actual lapse in composure, Eva seemed to gather herself. Certainly, there was peacefulness and resolve, a placated sense of gentleness to chase away the haunted desperation that had clung to her as a haggard noose. She'd walked against the tempest to arrive at his door, when all the momentum was pushing her in an entirely different direction, but this mattered more than Hiram seemed able to give himself credit for. Professionals? Maybe they'd helped keep her afloat but she was still broken. Give her something to care about though, someone to reach towards...

"It wasn't you. It was never you." These words were firm, resolute. "And you did what you had to do to save our lives. You acted defensively, that thing had already made it very clear it didn't intend to let us leave there alive." After all, by the time Hiram had laid a hand on it, she was danglingly useless off the end of a spear. "As for permanent ramifications, you are not responsible for my demons. And as provoked as they might currently be, that's not your fault either. This was a violation. That fucking thing was the monster, not you."

Something about those words clicked. The thread of conversation, woven intricately in between his adroit attempts to leave it unfettered, culminated as a cluster of tiny little hints that narrowed in on that single word as a focal point. His apologies, his concern about his own actions, the bizarre earlier reference to Oliver... Eva's expression, vivacious even now, shifted to convey her clarity and her head tilted as her eyes filled with all the emotion his couldn't. "Oh, Hiram. No. Come on, no." Once again, Eva reached out, her hand curling around his arm. "None of this has changed the way I think about you, okay? Not like that, anyway. I'd be dead without you. I'd be drunk and probably jeopardising my job right about now without you. Using you the way it did was fucked up but I don't think of you when I think if it. That's not what's fucking me up at the moment."

And with an irritated sigh, Eva struggled against her own frustration to elaborate, just enough to dig a grave for this particular concern. "It's not the first physical assault I've endured, and not even the first to land me in hospital. Those memories are the hard ones. This stirred them up but I haven't been sleeping right since I got here. And I wasn't in the greatest place in my head when I took the job so let's not play Blame Hiram for All of the Crazy Lady's Issues. You help more than you hurt, you know."

It was entirely unanticipated, and Hiram was good at anticipating social interactions. The most probable outcome of a word spoken here or there, the most likely response. And in his scrutiny he had failed to account for this consequence. For Hiram, a crack in his composure didn't look incredibly significant, it merely took the form of his own palm splayed against his chest, where the Synapse rested internally, as if unconsciously aware of its ever-present rhythm.

"You mentioned-" he murmured a start, voice a good deal softer and less wooden as his chin lifted to connect with her continuing efforts to tie lines together. Clearing his throat slightly, he continued, alert. "You had mentioned a few things." Ex-lovers. Jerks. Understatement. He could put the pieces together. His pattern recognition wasn't on par with Eva's, but he was primarily a forensic clinician first, educated in conducting patient interviews where forthrightness was not always an option, and that training died hard.

"That never should have happened to you. Such a thing is fundamentally senseless," he derided with a shake of his head. Hiram held contempt for abuse, for the violation of the rights of others, in ways that perhaps even a neurotypical might not otherwise find agreeable. Laws and customs were important to him, conduct was important to him, and when people transgressed those boundaries Hiram observed it acutely, keenly. Eva got the impression that were Hiram ever to face off against the individual responsible for hurting her, they would learn the meaning of the word mercy.

He laid his hand over hers, where it rested on his arm, fingertips trailed over the raised band of scar tissue that manifested in rows of three, encircled by dots that appeared some form of alien braille. It wasn't the first attack of this kind he had ever endured, either. His eyes, vivid and ceaseless in motion, a testament to such. "Your fortitude in the ability to seek me out despite these experiences, and these memories, is immensely commendable. You should not require to be so strong." His expression there was strangely odd, inscrutable, but genuine.

"I couldn't do it if there was nothing here worth the effort."

It didn't take much to turn her smile into a smirk, never had. And even in the midst of this, the weight of it all, there was a glimmer of spirit that allowed Eva just a brief moment to revel in notches of a hammer driving home a point. The brevity helped, gave her something to breathe through as his sentiments, provided as such absolutes, threatened to leave her entirely unprepared for a conversation she could have sworn she didn't really mind having with him. That was the luxury of a disconnect, however, the expectation that most things were relatively easy to discuss if she just dealt with them factually and brushed of the rest of it.

Eva withdrew her hand, cupping both around her tea, and considered the slip-slop of the liquid as she jiggled the mug from side to side. It was a game she played sometimes to help her focus; finding the right amount of agitation to keep the contents moving without sloshing any over the side. As a metaphor, it was just about too fucking apt.

"I was young, high as a kite and out of options as far as I was concerned." Abandoning the distraction, Eva drank from the mug instead and lifted her gaze to meet her friend's. Defiance. Resilience. Millions of tiny fractures all held together by a persistence that found more casual expression in impetuous arm wrestling competitions and drum solos using the breakfast cutlery. Everything that fuelled Eva's impulsiveness found its impetus in the sheer slog of effort it took to keep moving forward. "I'm not sixteen and stupid anymore. I just haven't actually figured out how to resolve the whole tomato-brain thing that makes it hard to function. Then I make shit choices again and the carousel ride continues." Smiling ruefully, Eva offered him a defeated shrug of her shoulders. "I can't undo any of it, but I will tell you this; you are not like him. You've never hurt me. It was just a stupid hologram."

In a swivel of events reflecting a near heel-face turn, Hiram laid a hand on that shrugging shoulder and gave it a brief squeeze, lips pressed together in a fond smile, brows knit at the center of his forehead pensively. She could have made the shit choice this time around, as well, but she hadn't, and somewhere in the silence that descended was that awareness, unspoken but poignant.

Addiction was not something that Hiram had extensive personal experience with, which was odd, because it was obvious to anyone with passing familiarity in Syndicate drugs that he had been chemically dependent on hishuri at one point, given his very evident neurological and ocular symptoms, but truthfully outside of the shur, Hiram didn't struggle with impulse control in that manner. When he did act it was decisive and periodically random, without a fully formed thought, but this contested with his naturally disciplined mindset well enough that excessive reward-seeking behavior wasn't a factor of his existence.

But he had a good deal of familiarity with it from an outside perspective. He had known many who succumbed to worse than the shur, long after its effects had worn clean through any neurotransmitters a person still held dominion over. Hiram's lack of ability to essentially breathe on his own without assistance spoke to an early start, over a long period of time. It was an odd way to lack understanding of addiction while simultaneously living a life that was completely ruled by its effects, the devastating and subtle alike, all intertwined. But what he did understand, intimately, was the conscious effort it must have taken Evahnae to make the choice to divert here, instead of to the bar, or the airlock, or any number of wacky-irrational-wacka-doodle choices behind an infinite number of doors.

"Well, that is merely because you have not encountered Dr. Hiram's Worm Machine, wherein we take all the worms out of your brain and spin them around a little, then gently put them back inside. They need a little wash. It is all in the infomercial." It was probably the most incoherent and nonsensical thing Hiram had ever said, in his totally monotone, rigid, unwavering voice.

And whereas most people would have labelled the retort strange and possibly even unnerving given the extremities of the overall situation and what it was reputedly costing both of them to continue forward in a wiggly, uneven sort of line, Eva instantly grinned. It wasn't a forced response, any more than her plethora of coping mechanisms could technically be said to be manufactured. Behaviour, after a while, became part of the infrastructure and, besides, Eva's sense of the absurd had followed her this far from way further back than the darkness that might occasionally provoke it at inopportune times. It was a connection point, where their individual divergences found camaraderie amidst a thousand condemnations.

She leaned forward, presenting the top of her head to him.

"If you can find any worms left to polish, you're more than welcome to them."

This way, they dodged in unison, twisting along an alternate track that gave respite from the quagmire. Whilst technically only having known each other a short time, there was an equal amount of intention to the observations Eva had made but never brought up as Hiram's own discretion when opting to simply accept that she was also awake and eating cereal in the galley at 3am. The more she knew about him, the more she thought about him, the more the telepath was able to recognise tell-tale signs, clues apparent due to nearly half-a-lifetime of garnering perspective and experience first-hand. It had never been a source of pride because how could anyone boast about sinking low enough to recognise the signs of multiple avenues towards drug dependence, but it was useful in her line of work to understand the different to between normal drunk and...something else. Her own experimentations didn't leave Eva with any moral high ground and, having lived within the confines of her own cesspit, Eva didn't like to pry. Instead, she kept leaning forward until the top of her head butted gently into his arm and just stayed there. A physical connection to quietly demonstrate a much deeper one.

At this point Hiram lamented his lack of ability for sleight of hand, because it would be the perfect opportunity to pull a sour gummy worm right from her tresses. He instead dropped his chin down to the top of her head a little like a cat before his eyes widened slightly and he indicated the television. "Better yet, we could always taste test the Ranch Dressing Soda." Hiram didn't have any issues with substances, but never let it be said that there was a useless item out there he didn't need to buy.

"I'm insulted by its existence." And yet, it was enough to coax Eva to twist towards the television in a way that didn't exactly minimise her proximity, but merely shifted it in such a way that leaning her temple against his arm became a far better compromise. "Wait, bacon soda?" That got her to sit up. "With maple syrup? How?"

Sometimes, that was all it took; a diversion into the absurd, something to distract and appal, macabre fascination for how one exactly translated buffalo wings into soda form. It wasn't fun to sit in the treacle of past trauma, to be forced for the umpteenth time to swim against a current intent on dragging her under. Plenty of people coveted their pain but Eva had no qualms whatsoever about abandoning it for greener pastures. Greener, carbonated pastures.

"Why is there pickle juice soda?"

It made Hiram laugh; which was interesting, for someone who professed to have a lesser emotional experience than others-and this did seem very much correct, but the soft huff not intended for anyone else's ears was fond in a way that suggested that wasn't the entire story, either. Maybe it wasn't truly possible; individuality without emotionality wasn't as likely as a constructed understanding of events might otherwise indicate. Marinating in the pickle-juice of trauma wasn't fun, and he didn't see fit to wallow; certainly less than most, but the contrast, for a split-second, was sharp and citrusy. The allure of the strange and vexing things that people could buy had definitely been amongst the more fascinating discoveries in his integration to greater, civilized society. "Perhaps it's delicious. Only one way to find out." Hiram whipped out his personal comm device, mischievous.

"You will not!"

Except, it was very evident that he actually would because the light in Eva's eyes was altogether too familiar; an immediate return to a vitality that, whilst now tempered by the understanding that it did not always exist without effort, had proven to be particularly resilient to common-sense. All of her professional sensibilities were horrified that these flavours existed but there was no force in the known galaxy that would stop Eva from trying them. Wide eyes gleamed at him, so reminiscent of every expression she'd worn prior to dragging him into something ill-advised. Scrambled eggs, Easter bonnets, drum solos and movie dates...

"Wait, wait, get the 24 pack; it has apple pie!"

"Shhh," Hiram held up a finger, and then very seriously placed his order for the 24-pack Dr. Worm's Soda Special (he'd gotten the worms from somewhere, after all) which, somehow, was delivered with all the gravitas of the good doctor himself, features perfectly schooled just as they had been with the old fashioned bonnet placed upon the top of his head. He ended the call with a flourish and a little bow. He made a face, though, shaking his head. "It also has liver and tripe. I did not think it could get worse than ranch, but I was incorrect."

The shiver that ran right down Eva's spine was a very visceral response, the culmination of a highly-effective imagination's best efforts to predict the future. She wasn't dramatic enough to gag except she was. "What's the delivery window? I need to prepare for this."

Hiram checked the tracking number with a few quick swipes. "Ah, two to four business days. I hope Captain Gregnol does not mind his vessel accosted by interstellar courier services."

That only warranted a snort. "He owes us." For the sake of the improved mood and to spare herself from tripping into another dark hole, Eva left it at that. There was a conversation brewing with Gregnol, one that she had been putting off because she wanted to be in a better place for it, to represent what she had to say with at least some stability, but the brief tension in her jawline suggested there might be some appeal to being a fly on the wall when the time came.

It might have been the reminder of uncomfortable confrontations to come, or simply the culmination of multiple points of exhaustion, but the lingering huff of Eva's disgruntled opinion of their command team followed her all the way down to a position she'd adopted once before; curled into a ball on her side, wrapped ridiculously in her blanket and monopolising Hiram's leg for a pillow. The mostly-empty tea was set on the floor within reach and Eva fidgeted until she could see the television and commandeer most of the available comfort. Often, when deep in the throes of crisis, her choices about who to latch onto could be frivolous and downright chaotic; panic and desperation parading as promiscuity. To have somewhere remarkably different and yet still receptive enough to her need to cling was uncommon.

She exhaled slowly.

And then bunched her nose up at the television. "Okay, I get it; it's a fish decoration. By why does it sing?"

"It has to sing," Hiram said, reasonably. He probably owned one, let's be real.

He settled his hand against her back, hesitantly at first and then with intention. It wasn't the first time he'd formed an attachment to someone. Jeza Lajuz had been the first, an Andorian from his sophomore year at Northside who could not be more opposing to Hiram's temperament, his own tempestuous and mercurial and passionate, but nevertheless they'd somehow managed to fit together until they couldn't. Jeza had gotten hurt, inevitably more than Hiram, which he regretted but could not make right.

And then followed Rael, on the surface a far more logical companionship, but Vulcans too were placid only on the surface, beneath the waters which ran deep into the very planetary core. They'd parted far more amicably, but only served to highlight to the doctor that he wasn't very fit for romantic company. So he had moved away from such pursuits, and found himself here-a situation he hadn't precisely meant to occur, but life usually happened in the moments that weren't planned.

And while Jeza and Rael and even the other connections in his life, John and Nathalie and Cal; through them each was a pervasive sense of... from the outside, what certainly appeared a lot to others like an excessive degree of pathologizing that only those who had been present from the beginning could really grasp as a necessity of structure and routine that prevented an irrational lashing-out, that prevented harm and antiscocial tendencies bred into Hiram from birth that while understood could not be excused on his own recognizance.

Ultimately, it was rare that Hiram allowed himself to be OK as he was, without qualification. Without a but, somewhere in there. OK, but, make sure. But, (ironically) at a certain point, when you laid down your arms and forged the terms of agreement that would govern your actions from that point forward, you had to step back beyond the confines of force and allow that process to occur organically. The process of peace could only exist, fundamentally, as a self-sustaining circumstance.

And it was at that very point in Hiram's life that he had found himself encountering Evahnae Kohl, who saw him for what he was-the whole picture, perhaps not, but enough of the pieces that she'd formed an accurate understanding regardless, and allowed him. It wasn't the same type of connection he'd had previously, but it was one sorely lacking.

"If it does not sing, it cannot be a singing bass."

See? Reasonable.

"An absence I think the galaxy would recover from."

It wasn't as if Eva could easily explain why this was okay. Despite their experiences, and the degree of intent with which she at least had pursued any sort of acquaintance with him, there was little point in arguing that they still barely knew each other. Shared trauma dug deeper, faster, but it couldn't account for decades of compilation nor the way personal stories and anecdotes interacted to inform a deeper connection. Time mattered, up to a point at least, and though it wasn't necessarily unusual for the telepath to employ familiarity as a tactic to aid distraction, this level of vulnerability was not typically admissible in those circumstances. Perhaps it mattered that Hiram somewhat fit into the same demographic as those scant few who knew her all the way down to her mushed-up core; her fathers, Jonas, the list wasn't very long but Eva did have a history of falling to pieces in the presence of men categorically unlikely to be hampered by physical attraction. Love and sex had never aligned particularly successfully in Eva's experience. Keeping them separate might not have been elevating her much but it had made the last few years somewhat tolerable.

It meant that a touch like his hand resting against her back meant everything without meaning too much. It wasn't greedy, or manipulative, and if it was nervous at all, it was because she'd invaded the personal space of an exceptionally reserved person and not because, she seemed to intrinsically understand, there was any internal libido wrangling to master. Eva may very well have been the only woman in existence who craved a man who didn't find her beautiful and desirable but the universe was a strange place. She'd certainly been a big help in that regard too; puffy eyes, runny nose, hair like a bird's nest. Hiram could count himself very specifically unseduced.

And yet, chemistry still churned. The interlocking mechanism of kindred spirits who had no interest in glandular prioritisation and cut right past the function of arousal to foster simple affection. Warmth. Mutual comfort. She had come to him tonight because no where else felt safe but also because it had finally occurred to Eva that maybe he needed to be checked on, that she was worried for him and angry on his behalf. That she wasn't okay with him sitting alone somewhere processing a violation that had depicted him as the kind of mindless, thoughtless brute she suspected he was occasionally accused of being. Regardless of time spent, Hiram was her friend because Eva had decided that was the case and that simple act of intent was so reminiscent of a much younger version of herself, the child who had always been the first to reach out to misfits and outsiders, that she really couldn't describe how comforting it was to find her way back to it. It had nothing to do with craving the distraction of physical release.

An arm slipped beneath his leg allowed her to hug it, cheek smushed against his knee as the wriggling gyrations of the animatronics on screen provoked a grimace. "Why would anyone hang that anywhere?" Immediate revelation. "You literally have one, don't you." Eva banged her forehead gently against his knee. "Why? Why? That thing is going to animate in the middle of the night and eat us all!"

"Oh no," Hiram insisted, not exactly easily playful but certainly more inclined to its approach around a presence like Eva, who had seemingly taken his hand and lead him along the winding upside-down intergalactic black holes and footsteps inside event horizons to plain old silliness.

It was not an ordinary friendship, perhaps-the both of them not only bonded together by a shared understanding of things that most should not understand, but also because that understanding afforded the both of them a skewed sense of interpersonal boundaries regardless; it helped that they both held enough of an awareness of healthy relational dynamics to buoy any potential side-effects, but romance aside, Hiram's intersections with sexuality and arousal were as strange and off as the rest of him, well enough that it had interfered with his ability to be intimate with Jeza and Rael alike, a deep, abiding anxiety and hesitation that had stalled it in its tracks.

Both simply incapable and unable to find the ability to be comfortable in Hiram's complexity and confusion over the matter and both, generally decent people, unwilling to take advantage of him for their own benefit. The fact that he'd been willing wasn't enough, the fact that he was able to convey that he comprehended and was acting on his own free will, was somehow not enough. He was, consistently, placed in the position of having enough sense of self-monitoring to present as desirable, but when peeled back, found to be foundationally decrepit. Propelled by a sense of what should be.

They'd all more or less silently agreed that it wasn't the right time, or the right place, and Hiram had drifted and bobbed along the sea on his own, carrying the weight of himself. This simple touch, reserved as it was, was more familiar. A type of intimacy that was inwardly moved, reached out for its own sake, a simple desire to connect. Genuine comfort, unmarred by ulterior motives beyond itself. Hiram's conception of beauty aside, he gave the impression and bearing of someone who didn't apply much of a standard on attractiveness in general; he didn't seem to notice anyone, male or female, outside of how they related to him on an interpersonal level. It was reasonable to assume that beauty was rarely a factor for Hiram.

"Barry the Bass only accepts payment in the form of brain worms. Seeing as how yours have been extracted, we can now appease the Master Fish." Hiram nodded very sagely. It was nonsense, stream-of-consciousness, delivered in such a factually punctual tone that in and of itself presented a simple comedy; Hiram was severe and staunch, but he had worked in a pediatric setting for a long time; and that childlike sense of innocent curiosity toward the strange and unusual was something he could accommodate, even if he was somewhat stiff in return.

It was no mistake that children had always liked Hiram and gravitated toward him, and why he'd elected to pursue that as a specialty; kids usually cut straight to the heart of things. His mentor had noticed it during his rotations and steered him in that direction, and he'd had his own internal crisis about whether or not it was OK, pouring over articles on his computer about how individuals like him were corrupted and whether or not he might inflict the same damage on a child just by being in their presence; but eventually he had been convinced otherwise.

And it had been as healing as it was rewarding. He saw the rest of his life stretch out that way, until he'd received the call. Until Neilan Sherer had reached out to him and told him the news that had rocked his entire being and shattered the world he'd built for himself. The Navir was a crossroads, and on one side, a life of uniforms and salutes and orders and drills and procedures and protocols-and on the other, was something else. A choice to do something different, the choice that had lead him here. And at his core-what could be understood by simplicity and nuance alike, Hiram tried his best not to be a monster.

Some days it was easier than others; some days it was closer than others. On the days when he saw himself drive a knife into the gut of his friend; a word loaded with meaning and purpose to him, that was not frivolous at all despite their lack of information about one another. It was information he had intended to continue learning before suddenly confronted by the possibility that her existence would end, and that was unacceptable. That it would end by his hand had centrally destabilized him, but it was an effort made manifest in every aspect of his being right down to Barry the Bass, which did in fact hang on his wall.

He pointed to it right above the dining room table, visible from the couch.

"I hope it eats you first."

Eva had to hand it to these marketers; they certainly moved through the products at a speed that left you in an oddly gratifying sense of anticipation, mingled with the slight panic of urgency that shortened the span of consideration normally allotted for sensible decision making. If you didn't act swiftly, the opportunity was lost, and who didn't want to turn their home into a house of horrors? The current offering; a wind-up dog that yapped and occasionally flipped a mechanism that forced it to turned a backwards somersault, was so utterly pointless that the brunette could feel her brain oozing out of her ear to form a puddle between Hiram's legs, but could she look away?

She needed that damn dog.

For a completely inexplicable reason, indicative of the writhing chaos of mind worms still stuffed into her skull, Eva was reminded of a musical toy her grandmother had given her when she was younger. An utterly horrendous thing, she had come to appreciate with the wisdom of hindsight, a doll once belonging to a much older relative who apparently held no concern for the sheer capacity to summon creatures from the abyss that the infernal thing clearly was designed specifically for. A much younger Evahnae had been fascinated and appalled by it in equal measures; the way its head spun because the internal mechanisms designed to rotate it through several jolting dance sequences had somehow degraded over time, and the way its singing voice stuttered at the same point during certain phrases right as its glassy, vacant eyes rolled backwards into its head to complete a full rotation instead of the artificially programmed pan from side to side that was meant to mimic melodic entrancement. She and Jonas had ended up burying it in a neighbour's backyard when Eva had finally had enough of its tendency to reduce her best friend to bed-wetting. She hadn't thought about it in years.

A series of dogs backflipped on screen. Eva hummed the first notes of a melancholy phrase that probably wasn't going to open a portal to hell in Hiram's living room.

And yet, it was a pretty tune too and, reminiscent of Terran lullabies, might have been easily employed in far less terrifying applications by mythical maidens seeking to soothe the savage tendencies of prophetic beasts. Maybe it was apt. Eva wasn't sure if she could properly convey to Hiram just how unconcerned she was on the levels that understandably left him shaken. She was a woman who, unfortunately, had far too much intimate proof that certain expected conditions were no guarantee against harm. Maybe she just didn't know enough to see the capacity for threat but in many ways, absence of any point of reference was kind of the point. Hiram had saved her when indifference would not likely have seen him punished. It required more energy than she currently had to spare to fret about whether or not his condition could ever result in a different outcome. She knew what it was like to nearly lose her life at the hands of someone who professed the kind of sentiment that should have made that the least likely outcome; she'd been loved by a monster before, Hiram just....wasn't.

And so she hummed for him, and watched the little dogs yip-yap into their somersaults.

Hiram let his eyes close, not precisely relaxing against Eva in the manner that suggested sleep, but at the very least able to indulge in something more restful than upright mindless absorption of media. It wasn't the first time they'd found themselves in this position, either, and it spoke to an emerging pattern of shared company, one that

 

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