Participants:
| Scene Title | Miala Tsiny Aho |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | It is how you say "I am sorry" in Malagasy. |
| Date | December 7, 2009 |
Mandritsara, MLF Bunker
It took the men cleaning out the armory considerably less time to finish when they found out they had far less time than usual; the morphine was supposedly going to last a couple of hours less than had originally planned, but in the end the hurry to clear an impromptu cell out was unnecessary. The hours passed, and Huruma stayed virtually in the same state as she had begun- slumber, however induced as it was. The concrete is cold and space very cramped, but the locker is just the right size for Huruma to remain tossing around in fitful semi-consciousness. For the first few hours, it really was the morphine- as time went on within the past day, it was easier to tell that it was simply her own brooding that kept her curled angrily up in various corners. Not much has changed from that fact as of yet.
If someone maintains a presence outside of the locker for more than a minute, however, it is then that they'd hear a threatening noise or three until they went away. Because of this, there is a bored-looking guard a few steps down the hall, who seems more interested in polishing his knife than actually guarding the locker where Dajan's mother has been stored. Luckily, for most of Monday now she has been stretched out against the rear wall, face turned to observe the space that is not the door.
Mentally, her state is far less deceivingly calm; when she woke up the first time it was anger all around- the second time, after further sleeping off the morphine and strain of sore muscles, it was slightly less. Since then Huruma has in fact been wide awake most times, even if her eyes were squeezed shut. She has been in jail before, and this feels no different from that. It may feel no different, but the reason is. And that is the only thing that she has to think about while in the locker- why she is in it in the first place.
First it was going over numerous memories of more than half her lifetime ago; Nigeria, boarding school- the twins, come eventually. She spent a lot of time on that. Second, it was of more recent memories; different things from her year in New York, and those very few people that she ended up truly connecting with. In the end, the only one that makes something stir with relevance is Abby. Abby, who has taken up a droplet of the space left behind by Huruma's real children. The last time she saw Abby nose to nose wasn't really remarkable- it is the one from her dreams that she ends up remembering best in the context of her current world. The Abigail from a pseudo-nightmare about this very subject.
The subject of whether or not Huruma was certain- whether or not Huruma had felt the thread snap- the thread between a mother and her children. She never answered the dream, but Huruma did not quite feel that thread snap apart, even over the years. It was always there in the back of her mind, disregarded. Until now, that is, when it has manifested in her son.
The very source of the anxiety she feels approaching that door from down the hall. One step at a time, it takes Dajan's slow gait what feels like an eternity to make his way down the hall. Coming to stop outside of the steel door that locks the armory, his presence is felt more so than heard, right up until three solid clangs against the metal resound in the concrete chamber beyond. "Are you ready to talk?" There's a pain in his voice echoed in his heart, and that anxiety Huruma can taste on the wind is tinged with an undercurrent of faint pain. "You at least need to have something to eat— drink… Medication."
She can feel him settling up against the wall outside the door, voice ringing hollow through the metal, as if he were talking in to a tin can. "I don't want to keep you in there, but I don't want to add to my collection of body art either… I think I look fine the way I am, yeah?" It's a nervous attempt at humor.
Even without having touched it for more than two decades- the encounter with Dajan at the meeting has brought his presence back. Huruma tenses long before she can feel him on the other side of that steel door. The anxiety in the forefront and the pain underneath leaves a very bitter and very sour taste in Huruma's mouth- but then again, that may very well be her empty stomach aiding such a thing. If there were some moments where Huruma never wanted her ability, this would be on the list.
Dajan's words on the state of his body bring a faint tremor to Huruma on the inside. She not only failed- but he had to live as what she made him. What about Juwariya?
"Fine…" It's more of an acknowledgement than a bitter response from Dajan, as if Huruma has chosen to go with the salad instead of the soup, an entirely neutral reaction. "Then you can listen, at least. I know you're awake, I can feel you breathing on the concrete." The barest sound of his frame sliding down the wall can be heard in the dimly lit armory, over the faint buzzing of the fluorescent lamp overhead. "I wasn't sure it was you, not until you did what you did, at least…" The contrast of Dajan's accent from the others here is striking, the very plain — if not coarse — delivery of clipped english tones seems to so sharply contrast his appearance.
"You might want to know, my sister is doing… well." His aixnety grows, along with a thread of regret. "She lives in Morocco…" The guilt rises, "at a hospital." Dajan's voice trails off on those words, nothing but the sound of Huruma's breathing and the buzz of the lamp to keep her company. "I do not see her much…"
Huruma's eyes dart down to the concrete floor, breath pausing. Her eyebrows knit, and one hand moves to push her upwards into a sitting position. No use pretending- but feeling her breathing on concrete? There is some mixed feeling of pride in her for that moment, eyes glancing for but a second towards the door and its frame.
The pause permeates the already one-sided conversation; by the time that Dajan breaks it he will have felt Huruma's feet moving her nearer, the palms of her hands soon pressing against the wall just behind him. They can feel one another, even without vision- there is a somewhat proper irony in that.
"She is not jus'your sister. She is your twin- of course you feel guilty-" Huruma's first words are not entirely the words most befitting circumstance… but she spoke back regardless.
The presence of proximity is both acute and dull all in one. Huruma is both close to her son's senses, and at the same time divided by a two foot thick concrete wall. He is silent, when she opines about the union of twins, about Dajan's place with her. His response, hollow as it may sound on the other side of the door, is tinged with a rising sensation of frustration, confusion, and anger.
"Do you?"
"…only now, that I know I failed." The calmness that was in her has all but exploded. Huruma's voice has never been one to shudder- but it does now. "This is th'exact reason- what I did- I did t'protect you both from what I knew th'world t'be- from what I knew I was." What she was is not what she is, anymore- but the world is still a deep dark place- same as it was when the twins were born.
Perhaps her intentions were some of the purest she could ever have- but the means- not the wisest.
"Very noble of you." Dajan's contempt simmers behind a vaneer of calm words that is betrayed by the way she can feel his emotions thorugh the porous concrete. "I might have considered, once, doing that very thing to my sister. But I could never bring myself to harm my own flesh and blood…" Dajan's words grow softer, harder to hear thorugh the door, "…which is why you're still alive after what you did."
Huruma can hear him move, away from the wall and to the door. She can see the passing of shadows of his feet thorugh the narrow space between the metal, hear him rest his body weight up against it. "You're no use to anyone in there. We need every able hand we can get for this… even if you don't care, or— whatever it is you're thinking now." Dajan does not have the luxury of feeling what she feels, but to Huruma it is more of a curse, as she feels his disappointment and shame. Shame for who, only Dajan knows.
"Do you understand?" As if he were talking to a child. "You need not talk to me, but I expect you to do what you came here to do, and not some old misguided agenda of mercy."
Like a cat at a window, Huruma follows his movement with eyes trained and hands panning out to feel the surface of the wall. She lies against the stone just inside the unhinged side of the steel door, cheek brushing against the rough surface. The contempt is clear- the disappointment- the shame- it is so close and now so familiar that it rings like a crystal bell. Her breath on the stone is now just as rough- compounding a great deal of things that she has long been unfamiliar with otherwise. There is anger towards herself- which is not uncommon- but there is also several degrees of shame, whether or not she wishes to recognize it as such. There are only so many words to possibly use in place of it, and it always means the same. The knot in her throat comes out as a rabbit's heartbeat against the concrete.
"…I care more than anyone ever thinks. Either too much- or too little- I can neve'tell- empaths can only look inward as much as th'next man." Huruma's tone goes from amiss of everything to almost distrustful of its own words. "I understand." The answer sounds as sincere as it can get; but she pauses as if unfinished with her thoughts, mouth likely stuck ajar. Huruma doesn't finish- but there is obviously something or several somethings there that she wants to say, and they are now hovering in the space also taken up by door and wall.
The protesting shriek of old, damp metal comes before the snap of a hinged lock moving inside the door, retracting metal bars from where they had slid inside the wall. The armory door swings inward with a groan of old hinges and a shrill creak once it stops. Dajan's frame looms broad in the doorway, one hand raised to support his weight on the frame over his head as he leans in to the room, affording Huruma his unscarred profile. "Bosede has your medication, and there is food in the galley." It isn't a contemptual comment, but it is terse. He is affording her only what she affords him, like some passive-aggressive game of tug-o-war.
"If you need me for anything…" The words are said as if to indicate and I assume you won't is in there somewhere. "Jus' talk to Kwasi, he knows where I am at all times." Then, hesitating before he withdraws from the doorway, Dajan's eyes drift down to the floor. "An' you should apologize to Tau. What you did to him, he was very disturbed by. He has not said much for the last day."
Any other time she would have smiled about making such a big man able to stand so little; it never comes, even if that little devil kekekes in the back of her mind until it runs out of air. Huruma remains just on the inside, draped against the wall save for her hands, which have lowered. The neutral expression on her face is only disturbed by the new bend of her eyebrows- the furrow above her nose lifted upward in something that could be taken as forlorn. Whether she realizes this is up for grabs.
Huruma stares back at Dajan for the length of his speaking; they are virtually eye-to-eye, her inches over him detracted as he has not been shut in an armory locker and left to scrunch up, and tiredness- the sort of tiredness that comes not in body- plays a large part. Silence in this situation is as good as confirmation.
Huruma may be done with talking for the moment, but movement is another matter. She certainly does not leap onto him like she did the table, nor does she reach out to wrap a hand tight onto his throat. Gentle gestures are new to those who have never seen them from Huruma, but they are not unfamiliar to her. They require a moment of steeling beforehand, entirely on her part. Her hand goes from hovering at her side to skirting towards him, fingers nervous and only half outstretched in an attempt to cup his jaw in them.
It feels like such a bizarre nightmare- she has to make sure it's real. In that sense, the brevity of her Son being alive has not hit her quite yet.
It is like touching a statue, for all that Dajan remains motionless during the touch. His uneven stare is leveled to her, stoic countenance broken up by the unflattering massacre of chiselwork scars. His brows knit, lips downturning into a brief frown, then eyes slowly fall shut. For a moment, everything is equal parts still and silence, right until he pulls his jaw away, opens his eyes, and looks at her like he would look at a stranger.
"Your lieutenant is awake…" Dajan adds in solemn offering, a triviality to be sure, but something to distance him from a comfort he is not sure that he wants, but on the same token is not sure he wishes to push away entirely either. "I…" And in those words, he shows his first hesitation, not something oft found in Huruma's spawn.
Dajan steps out into the hall, not so much so that she can pass him, but so that he can start to put distance between the two again. For all the times in his life that Dajan thought of what he would say, what he would do when presented with his mother— none of those eventualities panned out. There are some things you can mentally prepare yourself for, but what Dajan finds himself faced with is nothing of the sort.
Eventually, he's going to want answers. But as he turns his back on her, letting that regret and sadness swell to fill where once was mostly anxiety, he knows that answers will have to wait for another day. If they ever come at all.
On the other end of the spectrum, Huruma was never remotely prepared for such a thing; she tucked away the span of memories between childbirth and abandonment, leaving it to collect dust. Though the door is open and the hall the same, Huruma leaves, only to sink back against the wall where Dajan had been leaning. Only part of it is still home to any warmth, but she remains there for now, watching his shoulders as he turns away.
Madagascar and the Vanguard seem suddenly insignificant compared to the sight of Dajan walking away, the molasses-like wave of sadness welling in the hall behind him.