[ Markus affirms the hopes that he hadn't dared to admit he still has for himself, and that's beyond what Fitz expected anyone to give him. He twists his hands in the fabric of Markus' shirt, finding purchase despite the way his right-hand smarts with the movement. Against his instincts, he holds the moment, prolonging their contact. It helps that Markus offers emotional and physical steadiness with his grip, bringing him past the breaking point and into the aftermath. Give him a minute to release the last of his shuddery exhales. ]
Stop being so understanding. [ cry-hiccup-laughed into Markus's shoulder. ] It's — terrible.
[ said in the tone of someone who does not, in fact, think it's terrible, the beginnings of gratitude rising from his side of the bond, tinged with an unabashed fondness for Markus, in this moment. He allows that to linger, too, as his breathing evens out. Finally, Fitz pulls back enough to leave only a hand on Markus' shoulder, the other rubbing at his eyes. ]
God, I'm really. [ he stops himself, bothered by how croaky his voice sounds. ] I'm dragging this out. Hanging off you. Not that you aren't — comfortable. [ When he lifts his head, hand dragged back through his half-curls, he cringes at his own wording. An improvement on his formerly heartbroken, at least. Mm-hmm, there's Fitz, pulling himself together in the messiest way possible, perhaps the only way he knows how. ]
[ in a bit of mumble, though it hardly matters when they're this close. ] Swear I'm not normally this needy, as a [ a brief hesitation, as he wonders if the classification still applies, despite how good Markus has been to him. ] friend.
[ Now that's a lie. He's absolutely needy, across the board, but let him have this shitty joke. ]
[None of it enough to dissuade Markus from being this pillar in the storm. Emotions both tumultuous and steadfast are rubberbanding between them, but the android lets Fitz cry, lets him cling, allows himself to be anchor made of iron so that when the other is done, there’s something still fixed and grounded waiting for him when words return.
When there’s space between them again, after Fitz steps back with a hand still on his shoulder, the confirmation of the term comes easily enough. He replies with only the smallest tremor of ebbing, shared emotion inlaid in each syllable.]
And what kind of friend would I be if I didn’t let you be needy every once in a while? [Friend slingshotted back without any hesitation at all — confirmation for the other, an unerring absolute. It takes more than an uncertain identity and omission of information to shake something rooted more deeply into the ground.]
I suppose. [ still soft. ] Just the once in a while. [ another concession and acceptance. They are friends, aren't they? Stronger still for the possibility of truth between them, when there are so few in this world who can walk that path alongside any of the displaced.
His hand twists in the fabric at Markus' shoulder, still a little needy and uncertain, as he collects himself. ]
I ought to, ah, finish off the details, now that you know the, uh, context. [ the framework, aida as ophelia, the androids. ] If that's what you still want, I mean — no more blindsides by my teammates in the future. [ a final commitment to the truth, belated though it may be. ] Not when it could be avoided.
[ not that they would mean to be insensitive or accusing but, well, a faint memory reminds fitz how far they, too, were willing to go to save the world. best make it concise and get it over with ]
[Honesty is like the application of tempering to a steel blade; though the conversation they've had — and will continue to have — may not be easy, they’ll only walk away from it stronger than before. More assured in each other’s trust, being closer allies and better friends. He has no doubt of that.
And so, Markus nods.]
I want to hear the rest of it. If you’re still willing to share it with me.
[A hand to reach up behind Fitz, to lightly press into his shoulder, and Markus turns to urge Fitz to walk with him. A slower pace than before, as if detaching them slowly from the magnetic pull of passing emotion and insecurity; as if the summer heat filtering through the trees might continue to provide both of them a tired sort of focus and realignment.]
[ if he's willing, like Markus isn't the one who deserves the choice — the truth. ]
Yeah, yeah, okay.
[ walking steadies him, much like the touch as his shoulder, the final confirmation that they're in this together. He can barrel through this, condense it to the most necessary parts. His hands flex and ball again, unable to find purchase. A slow exhale follows, as if he'll need to air to push through what's to come. ]
[ finally, in a forcibly even tone. ] In there, we — I experimented on Inhumans, people with powers like us now, like Daisy had before, too. [ added to contextualise her instinctive feelings toward the androids, who targeted her. ] and in doing so, I cracked it. Figured out how to make her human and give her any of the abilities she wanted. Teleportation, superhuman strength, regeneration, electrokinesis. [ the list goes on, each one stolen from someone else. ] My friends tried to wake me up — the love of my life from this world, too, fought to reach me, but I couldn't, wouldn't.
[ His shoulders lift, a shrug that pains him, so recently after his injuries. There's no excuse to be made. A hell of his own making is just another thing to overcome. ]
When we got out, we didn’t have long to, uh, [ rolling one hand. ] acclimate. [ The duality, two lives worth of memories crashing down on him, threatening to tear him in two. ] But I do know this: Ophelia said that in the Framework, she didn't have a choice, either, and that she wanted. [ He stops himself. No, he can't omit this part. ] She wanted me to be the first thing she chose. [ a somber admission, paired with a lookup, into the light. Not a confession that fosters warmth, then. ] And when I asked her — begged her to hold onto that, to empathy, to think about how she felt for me, how it would feel to help my friends who were still in trouble, that’s what she chose, Markus. [ His voice rises, impassioned in his final defense of her, one that he knows won’t withstand this conversation. ] Not fear for her new mortality or vengeance for how we’d wronged her, but compassion. And if we'd been in a...a vacuum, or if it hadn't been me that she chose, she could have — might have stayed on that path.
[Experimenting on powered people. Markus feels his insides twist at the idea for multiple reasons — the inhumanity of it, the idea of placing the wishes of a single individual as more important than another’s wellbeing. And that Ophelia’s transition into her humanity would be one in which she would wield so much; too much. A mind still leaning into self-discovery, equipped with that kind of power — Markus can’t imagine it. Like being given a blade without knowing of the consequences of carving someone in two.
But he makes no remark on that. Again, he doesn’t interrupt. And again, he judges the changes in Fitz’s tone, where he pauses and where he stumbles. Where defense flares up for the sake of Ophelia, even if it means he offers himself up to the altar of blame and self-deprecation once more.]
What she chose. [—comes the quiet echo. The word that all of this seems to hinge on, the conversation pivoting on the idea of conscious choices and the consequences of them. Of having power over your own actions, versus these same actions being influenced by outside sources.]
You give her agency, but then you’re quick to take it back by placing the blame of her other choices squarely on your shoulders.
[The one thing worth pointing out, worth mentioning in its strange paradox of itself.
But because it feels like a story unfinished, loose ends still dangling, Markus adds nothing else just yet. Only an even push forward.]
[ It's complicated, he wants to say, but Markus has stood here for ages untangling this already. Too clever and too patient to ignore, not flinching away despite the most gruesome detail coming moments earlier. Complicated is an excuse like all the others. Either Ophelia shares the blame, or she doesn't. He rubs at his temple, considering. No, conceding. ]
I guess we both deserve the blame. [ but she's the one that everyone blames, so he makes a point to shoulder as much of it as he can. Hard to say if that's born of his instincts (and the undying loyalty) fostered in the Framework, when Fitz has always been inclined to blame himself the second anything he touches turns to rust. ]
Maybe if it was your first day feeling like that, [ a pleading look, head tilted to assess Markus' reaction. ] feeling everything without being able to compartmentalise or, or, or reflect, with too much power at your fingertips, fresh out of world where you were willing to kill for someone, and still ready to help him — to help me and save all my friends, even though I wanted something different now than I did in the Framework, you would — she did expect the same in return. [ what she had when they in the virtual was supposed to carry over, the same as the rest. The powers, the human body, the partner. ] Y'know, she chose me, [ gesturing between them. ] so I'm supposed to choose her, too.
[ his mouth thins, features caught in indecision. Should he feel guilty that he couldn't give that to her? Should he have been more careful, at least on day fucking one? He was a mess at the time, still reeling, and her actions after the fact aren't defensible, not even to him. ]
Only when she was talking about it, I thought she meant — I thought she meant she would understand if I chose my partner in this world 'cause Jemma — [ a noise of disbelief. AIDA absolutely read his file, knew his flaws and head inside and out, how could she not have accounted for the Jemma of it all? Telling, then, that his tone shifts, no longer uncertain, when he speaks about Jemma Simmons. If there's one thing he believes in, it's this. Her. ] — a love like ours has crossed galaxies and time and the bottom of the bloody Atlantic Ocean. [ he lifts his hands, as if helpless. ] S'not going away just because I've got a double life in my head.
[ He hadn't been sure the sentiment was shared, at first, only that his love wouldn't ever fade. Now, he knows she feels the same way. ]
So, when I said that, when I chose wrong, she went off. [ that, he doesn't blame himself for, though he frames it from her perspective and punctuates the statement by crashing his fist into his other hand. Again, a little bit of pain in his stitches. Noise, the slap of skin. Grounding and punishing. ] Started killing my coworkers and friends. [ a pause before the inevitable, gaze unflinching on Markus, even as he watches for flickers of emotion (judgment, unease) in his friend's face. ] We had to kill her first to keep the body count from climbing higher. [ and with finality — ] She's gone.
[ gone to wherever androids turned humans go, when they're burned in SHIELD bunker by inhuman hellfire. That's it. The whole of the truth, at least from Fitz's own perspective, tinged by his biases in the Framework and beyond it. ]
[The concession is enough for Markus to lose only the smallest line of tension in his shoulders. But the seriousness of this conversation still looms over the both of them, the deepest kind of unseen shadow, and his expression doesn’t change. Brow still creased with consideration as he turns over each word, and he glances back to Fitz on occasion to gauge his reaction — and so that the other can catch glimpses of this rumination, dancing behind blue and green eyes.
There’s approval, at least, in divvying out the blame between both Fitz and AIDA, for what it’s worth.
But when he’s asked to employ empathy (maybe if it was your first day feeling like that), it’s impossible for Markus to not consider how he might have felt, how he might’ve acted. To be willing to do so much for a single person, out of that wretchedly powerful emotion, that beautiful and terrifying many-clawed sensation: love. And its opposite, the dark twist that it takes when not given back freely and equally in return.
He doesn’t know how he would’ve reacted. He had so many years, so much time, to grow into someone completely different with Carl. He can only imagine what it must be like, so fresh with awakening, to experience everything with such newness that pleasure and pain alike would be so very… raw. That each offense must have felt like being rent in two.
As perceptive as Markus tries to be, as much understanding as he tries to apply to each side of the equation, it’s still difficult for him to relate to.
And it’s endlessly telling that Fitz possesses no hesitation in his words when he speaks of Jemma. A love that would pervade and overturn space, time, and the depth of the ocean itself. Romanticism, painted as fact. Ophelia was fated to be met with only disappointment.]
…I’m sorry. [-is a simplistic reply, but sincere on all fronts. The snippets of emotion that flicker across Markus’ expression isn’t judgment, not even disconcertion, just the sort of resign that comes from hearing a multi-faceted tragedy unfold, step by step.] For all those you lost. I know it doesn’t mean much, in the face of everything that you’ve been through.
[A beat.]
What you’ve just told me… it’s less about an android becoming human, but someone who was ill-equipped to deal with a very poignant human emotion. You understand that much, don’t you?
[ "I'm sorry," makes him duck his head. As if he has any right to accept this, the figure who survived his own tragic play, when it would have been kinder if fate claimed him in the second act.
Easier to focus on the latter line of conversation. ]
I do. [ He nods, then pauses, glances at Markus for confirmation. ] I think I do.
[ To say Fitz understands the androids or Ophelia just because of the time he spent building AIDA or working with her, being with her, the fleeting hours where he just watched as she processed, talking him through how it felt — ]
There were too many other factors in play. [ Radcliffe's programming, the Framework, Leopold James Fitz. Love, then loss. ] And it was extreme, all of it. [ the physical and emotional drain more than any being could bear. He's eight months out and still in shambles. In truth, Fitz thinks he lives in the swing, always going from one end to the furthest reaches of the other — a quiet crest of emotion with Markus here, or a deadly slash at Daisy during the outbreak — but there are people catching his hand, fingers slipping through his own, trying to help him reach equilibrium until he can maintain it alone.
He doesn't know how to say what that means to him. Instead, it's something he'll need to show, when the opportunity presents itself. ]
That's what I told Daisy, when she asked me about her. And you. [ exhaling. ] Only no one else sees it that way, not yet. [ his voice lowers. ] Ophelia is our Elysian. More localised, but.
[ When Daisy, when anyone from his team meets Markus or Connor — or someone like them — they're going to see her. The man Fitz was with her. What she did. How she couldn't cope with being human for a mere forty-eight hours. ]
I should have told you the truth from the jump. [ because Markus deserves that, even though it's hard, complicated, much more than artificial intelligence gone haywire. He holds steady, then. ] I’m sorry I didn't.
[Parts of his friend still retreat at condolences, the I’m sorry causing Markus to lose Fitz’s gaze. Not what the other is really looking for, he knows, not when guilt will take that phrase and turn it inside out until it’s shaped like an ugly thing — but Markus says it because he means it. There's sympathy there; Fitz is a friend and therefore to hear these retroactive revelations still makes his insides twist, because the curtain is being drawn back to reveal just what kind of damage was done, made clearer with each branch the conversation takes.
Markus wishes he could halve that burden and sling a part of it onto his own shoulders. Or even just the tiniest sliver, the smallest degree, to remove it from the other man if it meant that he could feel steadier on his feet, even imperceptibly. Conversation might be all he can manage; concessions, emotions, regret, memory that circles over and over in one’s mind like a restless predator. But giving life to them with words can make them tangible, make them more present — and as they walk down the skypark trail in the wretched heat of the New Amsterdam summer, perhaps with some small miracle they might leave some of those shadows behind, like footsteps pressed into loam.]
I would’ve liked to have known the truth from the start. [He won’t lie about that. After this world’s disastrous experience with AI life, after having left his own still in the lurch, the interest is a poignant one for Markus. As if he might divine the best route for himself to take, based on the failures of others. Like there might be something illuminating in these histories; advice unspoken, a clearer path. A warning.
And yet—]
But I was a stranger. A man who called himself an android, when all you could associate with the term were experiences still too raw to share with someone you’d just met.
[A highly personal story, a retelling that still seems to shake Fitz’s core. He can’t blame him, and he definitely can’t really be upset with him.]
Daisy and I aren’t unfriendly with each other, you should know. Even if our initial meeting was less than ideal. Take that seed of hope and latch onto it for now, the potential that your friends might learn to see it as something… not so cut and dry, not so black and white. [He mulls over his next statement, trying to apply the right words to his meaning.] I don’t ever want to be like Elysian, and I hope to never give the impression that I should be any world's version of it. I always hope to be a better example to anyone who has a troublesome history with AIs.
[And finally, all that being said:] Thank you for telling me everything.
[ Hope does slip in — through the same cracks in his guilt and condemnation that Markus has pried wider, simply by listening, clarifying, questioning where no one else has before, acknowledging where Fitz misstepped and where he ought to be kinder, at least to himself. Not a blanket forgiveness, the kind he can't accept, but something more nuanced. ]
Thank you. [ faint again, still walking through the skypark on autopilot, as if the world around them has blurred, nothing but greens and light filtering this strange and intimate moment. Fitz does that sometimes. A focused single-mindedness that obscures all but the task or person in his sightline: Markus, offering him something he can't reject, no matter how much the self-punishment might satisfy the destructive impulses rolling around in his head. ]
It's only you who I've — well, Jemma, obviously, and Daisy was there — but you're the only one I've told the lot of it. [ Ah. Hastily, he adds: ] As I remember it. [ Memory takes a lot of poetic license, he thinks. Can't recall who said that. Fitz only knows he can't be trusted any longer, not with memory and not with this (despite this is the essential truth of what happened; it's hard for him to know that). ] You listening, everything you've said, what you're saying, you — it means a lot to me.
[ Fitz exhales, working two fingers under the collar of his shirt and brushing over the bandages there. ]
You are a good example, you know. Not just of AI's. Of all the examples. [ a tug at his collar, slight frustration over the effort of this. Trying to find the right words. Markus deserves the closest ones he can find, whatever he can string together to convey what he means. ] Of people. [ a beat. ] Only you don't have to be. Not all the time. I mean, that's a lot to ask of someone who's more than a — than an idea. [ His pace quickens, as if he's overstepped in saying that. ] You probably know that. Just. If you don't. [ an aborted shrug. ] I liked hearing about where you worked, what you get up to, before we were caught up in this again. [ He frees his hand from his collar, sweeping it across the nearby fixtures (a floral sculpture, a cluster of benches and trees, shading other wanderers). ] As a friend. As your friend. [ dropping his hands at his side. ] That's all.
[ Reiterated with greater confidence than before. Maybe if he can offer Markus a small reassurance (attention, companionship, honesty), he can allow this friendship, regardless of whether he deserves it or not. ]
[It’s an imperceptible change. Jaw setting, muscles there going taut, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it. The rest of Markus’ demeanor remains the same, looking only affected by the gratitude of his friend, ready to accept it and always willing to be there to aid him. Even if it’s only via a trek through the skypark, exchanging burdens with each other under lazy, whispering branches.
Even if Markus has a tendency to make that a lopsided exchange at best.
Because the talk of being an example — about not always having to be an example — doesn’t quite bring him unease, but it dredges up a part of him that’s hooked so deeply into duty, into obligation, into pressing forward for a purpose higher than his own, that makes it hard to think of himself as anything else. He is still all calmness to Fitz’ nervous energy, but there’s a hitch in his own words this time.]
I appreciate it, but— [A pause, readjusting his thought process, verbiage chosen carefully.] But I’m what others need to me to be, when they need me to be it. Especially when it comes to friends.
[Reaffirmation, the tug of a smile that he forces to not look apologetic in any way possible. But he affords Fitz the honesty he deserves.]
Just a part of who I am. It was that way back in Detroit, too. [Another hand stuffed into a pocket, a casual sort of air he doesn’t quite align to.] But if you’re signing yourself up to be someone I can complain to about the difficulties living in a human body, then I won’t say no.
[ Not so imperceptible that Fitz doesn't clock something shift with his unrelenting focus, the eyes of an engineer who knows a misplaced wire could shock him dead or rattle a base full of precious people. Can't say what passes over Markus' features, but there was movement there. He knows it.
Lightly, he knocks his fist against Markus' shoulder, more friendly than comforting. Fitz worries that something softer would be rebuffed, just like his statements seconds earlier. ]
If that's what you want. [ Who is he to deny that? A part of who Markus is, like Fitz's earth-shaking, heart-shattering devotion. A more clinical assessment is arranged and metered out. ] Sounds like a tough way to live, when people need different things. Yourself included. Dunno if I'd call it sustainable. [ then, as if brushing it off. ] Maybe that's just the scientist in me.
[ the logic side of his brain, throwing around terms like "sustainable" and wondering if you can divvy up yourself that much without losing pieces along the way. ]
You know I'll always answer, if it's you calling, at any rate.
[ a purposeful redirect. He'd like to field more than complaints, if he can. ]
[It’s well-employed, that scientific skepticism. Just casually enough stated to question Markus’ borderline martyr-like stance without actually questioning it. Observation, utilized in a way that allows Markus to reply, or to let it slide off of his shoulders like a thing ignored.
He finds he can’t do the latter, not completely. That Fitz has unwound so much of himself before him, that should allow him at least the same in return — if even by a small amount. His shoulder jostles a little with the friendly gesture, his grin tilting lopsided.]
Unsustainable? Maybe not. But sometimes it isn’t a matter of sustainability, only necessity that you keep pushing forward for reasons that are beyond yourself.
[But even so, the offer does not go unnoticed nor under appreciated.]
That being said, I know that I can rely on you. And I appreciate it more than you know.
[ Their pace evens and steadies, more at ease in the aftermath. In some ways, Markus gives the answer that Fitz anticipates. Fitz has known better (or perhaps equally good) and worse men in the style of Markus, built to rise above their contemporaries and stand with pride for something greater. And Fitz, while not in that league of heroes, fights as if he’s running out of time, every hour stolen from the spectre in his head.
Not sustainable. Necessary.
Repaying all of his vulnerability and concessions with one admission of his own, Markus gives a fraction, enough for the moment. Then he turns the conversation back on Fitz, terming him a known quantity, proven to be reliable despite all the evidence to the contrary. It makes his chest ache. People here as warm as his team, their specific configuration of atoms and memory only possible in this multiversal hub, and destined to blink out of this reality, by force or by choice.
We don’t need a martyr, he thinks, and forces the words to stay in his throat. Maybe they do. Maybe they will. The best causes always have one. If the time comes, if it’s necessary — ]
I know enough. [ His mouth curves, smile slight and sad. There nonetheless, persisting. ] You’re good at saying it. Showing it. [ He looks askance at Markus. ] And it means a lot. When it’s you.
[ clearing his throat, then. That’s enough sincerity for one day, isn’t it? ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Stop being so understanding. [ cry-hiccup-laughed into Markus's shoulder. ] It's — terrible.
[ said in the tone of someone who does not, in fact, think it's terrible, the beginnings of gratitude rising from his side of the bond, tinged with an unabashed fondness for Markus, in this moment. He allows that to linger, too, as his breathing evens out. Finally, Fitz pulls back enough to leave only a hand on Markus' shoulder, the other rubbing at his eyes. ]
God, I'm really. [ he stops himself, bothered by how croaky his voice sounds. ] I'm dragging this out. Hanging off you. Not that you aren't — comfortable. [ When he lifts his head, hand dragged back through his half-curls, he cringes at his own wording. An improvement on his formerly heartbroken, at least. Mm-hmm, there's Fitz, pulling himself together in the messiest way possible, perhaps the only way he knows how. ]
[ in a bit of mumble, though it hardly matters when they're this close. ] Swear I'm not normally this needy, as a [ a brief hesitation, as he wonders if the classification still applies, despite how good Markus has been to him. ] friend.
[ Now that's a lie. He's absolutely needy, across the board, but let him have this shitty joke. ]
no subject
When there’s space between them again, after Fitz steps back with a hand still on his shoulder, the confirmation of the term comes easily enough. He replies with only the smallest tremor of ebbing, shared emotion inlaid in each syllable.]
And what kind of friend would I be if I didn’t let you be needy every once in a while? [Friend slingshotted back without any hesitation at all — confirmation for the other, an unerring absolute. It takes more than an uncertain identity and omission of information to shake something rooted more deeply into the ground.]
no subject
His hand twists in the fabric at Markus' shoulder, still a little needy and uncertain, as he collects himself. ]
I ought to, ah, finish off the details, now that you know the, uh, context. [ the framework, aida as ophelia, the androids. ] If that's what you still want, I mean — no more blindsides by my teammates in the future. [ a final commitment to the truth, belated though it may be. ] Not when it could be avoided.
[ not that they would mean to be insensitive or accusing but, well, a faint memory reminds fitz how far they, too, were willing to go to save the world. best make it concise and get it over with ]
no subject
And so, Markus nods.]
I want to hear the rest of it. If you’re still willing to share it with me.
[A hand to reach up behind Fitz, to lightly press into his shoulder, and Markus turns to urge Fitz to walk with him. A slower pace than before, as if detaching them slowly from the magnetic pull of passing emotion and insecurity; as if the summer heat filtering through the trees might continue to provide both of them a tired sort of focus and realignment.]
Either way, let’s keep walking.
no subject
Yeah, yeah, okay.
[ walking steadies him, much like the touch as his shoulder, the final confirmation that they're in this together. He can barrel through this, condense it to the most necessary parts. His hands flex and ball again, unable to find purchase. A slow exhale follows, as if he'll need to air to push through what's to come. ]
[ finally, in a forcibly even tone. ] In there, we — I experimented on Inhumans, people with powers like us now, like Daisy had before, too. [ added to contextualise her instinctive feelings toward the androids, who targeted her. ] and in doing so, I cracked it. Figured out how to make her human and give her any of the abilities she wanted. Teleportation, superhuman strength, regeneration, electrokinesis. [ the list goes on, each one stolen from someone else. ] My friends tried to wake me up — the love of my life from this world, too, fought to reach me, but I couldn't, wouldn't.
[ His shoulders lift, a shrug that pains him, so recently after his injuries. There's no excuse to be made. A hell of his own making is just another thing to overcome. ]
When we got out, we didn’t have long to, uh, [ rolling one hand. ] acclimate. [ The duality, two lives worth of memories crashing down on him, threatening to tear him in two. ] But I do know this: Ophelia said that in the Framework, she didn't have a choice, either, and that she wanted. [ He stops himself. No, he can't omit this part. ] She wanted me to be the first thing she chose. [ a somber admission, paired with a lookup, into the light. Not a confession that fosters warmth, then. ] And when I asked her — begged her to hold onto that, to empathy, to think about how she felt for me, how it would feel to help my friends who were still in trouble, that’s what she chose, Markus. [ His voice rises, impassioned in his final defense of her, one that he knows won’t withstand this conversation. ] Not fear for her new mortality or vengeance for how we’d wronged her, but compassion. And if we'd been in a...a vacuum, or if it hadn't been me that she chose, she could have — might have stayed on that path.
no subject
But he makes no remark on that. Again, he doesn’t interrupt. And again, he judges the changes in Fitz’s tone, where he pauses and where he stumbles. Where defense flares up for the sake of Ophelia, even if it means he offers himself up to the altar of blame and self-deprecation once more.]
What she chose. [—comes the quiet echo. The word that all of this seems to hinge on, the conversation pivoting on the idea of conscious choices and the consequences of them. Of having power over your own actions, versus these same actions being influenced by outside sources.]
You give her agency, but then you’re quick to take it back by placing the blame of her other choices squarely on your shoulders.
[The one thing worth pointing out, worth mentioning in its strange paradox of itself.
But because it feels like a story unfinished, loose ends still dangling, Markus adds nothing else just yet. Only an even push forward.]
What happened to her after that?
no subject
I guess we both deserve the blame. [ but she's the one that everyone blames, so he makes a point to shoulder as much of it as he can. Hard to say if that's born of his instincts (and the undying loyalty) fostered in the Framework, when Fitz has always been inclined to blame himself the second anything he touches turns to rust. ]
Maybe if it was your first day feeling like that, [ a pleading look, head tilted to assess Markus' reaction. ] feeling everything without being able to compartmentalise or, or, or reflect, with too much power at your fingertips, fresh out of world where you were willing to kill for someone, and still ready to help him — to help me and save all my friends, even though I wanted something different now than I did in the Framework, you would — she did expect the same in return. [ what she had when they in the virtual was supposed to carry over, the same as the rest. The powers, the human body, the partner. ] Y'know, she chose me, [ gesturing between them. ] so I'm supposed to choose her, too.
[ his mouth thins, features caught in indecision. Should he feel guilty that he couldn't give that to her? Should he have been more careful, at least on day fucking one? He was a mess at the time, still reeling, and her actions after the fact aren't defensible, not even to him. ]
Only when she was talking about it, I thought she meant — I thought she meant she would understand if I chose my partner in this world 'cause Jemma — [ a noise of disbelief. AIDA absolutely read his file, knew his flaws and head inside and out, how could she not have accounted for the Jemma of it all? Telling, then, that his tone shifts, no longer uncertain, when he speaks about Jemma Simmons. If there's one thing he believes in, it's this. Her. ] — a love like ours has crossed galaxies and time and the bottom of the bloody Atlantic Ocean. [ he lifts his hands, as if helpless. ] S'not going away just because I've got a double life in my head.
[ He hadn't been sure the sentiment was shared, at first, only that his love wouldn't ever fade. Now, he knows she feels the same way. ]
So, when I said that, when I chose wrong, she went off. [ that, he doesn't blame himself for, though he frames it from her perspective and punctuates the statement by crashing his fist into his other hand. Again, a little bit of pain in his stitches. Noise, the slap of skin. Grounding and punishing. ] Started killing my coworkers and friends. [ a pause before the inevitable, gaze unflinching on Markus, even as he watches for flickers of emotion (judgment, unease) in his friend's face. ] We had to kill her first to keep the body count from climbing higher. [ and with finality — ] She's gone.
[ gone to wherever androids turned humans go, when they're burned in SHIELD bunker by inhuman hellfire. That's it. The whole of the truth, at least from Fitz's own perspective, tinged by his biases in the Framework and beyond it. ]
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There’s approval, at least, in divvying out the blame between both Fitz and AIDA, for what it’s worth.
But when he’s asked to employ empathy (maybe if it was your first day feeling like that), it’s impossible for Markus to not consider how he might have felt, how he might’ve acted. To be willing to do so much for a single person, out of that wretchedly powerful emotion, that beautiful and terrifying many-clawed sensation: love. And its opposite, the dark twist that it takes when not given back freely and equally in return.
He doesn’t know how he would’ve reacted. He had so many years, so much time, to grow into someone completely different with Carl. He can only imagine what it must be like, so fresh with awakening, to experience everything with such newness that pleasure and pain alike would be so very… raw. That each offense must have felt like being rent in two.
As perceptive as Markus tries to be, as much understanding as he tries to apply to each side of the equation, it’s still difficult for him to relate to.
And it’s endlessly telling that Fitz possesses no hesitation in his words when he speaks of Jemma. A love that would pervade and overturn space, time, and the depth of the ocean itself. Romanticism, painted as fact. Ophelia was fated to be met with only disappointment.]
…I’m sorry. [-is a simplistic reply, but sincere on all fronts. The snippets of emotion that flicker across Markus’ expression isn’t judgment, not even disconcertion, just the sort of resign that comes from hearing a multi-faceted tragedy unfold, step by step.] For all those you lost. I know it doesn’t mean much, in the face of everything that you’ve been through.
[A beat.]
What you’ve just told me… it’s less about an android becoming human, but someone who was ill-equipped to deal with a very poignant human emotion. You understand that much, don’t you?
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Easier to focus on the latter line of conversation. ]
I do. [ He nods, then pauses, glances at Markus for confirmation. ] I think I do.
[ To say Fitz understands the androids or Ophelia just because of the time he spent building AIDA or working with her, being with her, the fleeting hours where he just watched as she processed, talking him through how it felt — ]
There were too many other factors in play. [ Radcliffe's programming, the Framework, Leopold James Fitz. Love, then loss. ] And it was extreme, all of it. [ the physical and emotional drain more than any being could bear. He's eight months out and still in shambles. In truth, Fitz thinks he lives in the swing, always going from one end to the furthest reaches of the other — a quiet crest of emotion with Markus here, or a deadly slash at Daisy during the outbreak — but there are people catching his hand, fingers slipping through his own, trying to help him reach equilibrium until he can maintain it alone.
He doesn't know how to say what that means to him. Instead, it's something he'll need to show, when the opportunity presents itself. ]
That's what I told Daisy, when she asked me about her. And you. [ exhaling. ] Only no one else sees it that way, not yet. [ his voice lowers. ] Ophelia is our Elysian. More localised, but.
[ When Daisy, when anyone from his team meets Markus or Connor — or someone like them — they're going to see her. The man Fitz was with her. What she did. How she couldn't cope with being human for a mere forty-eight hours. ]
I should have told you the truth from the jump. [ because Markus deserves that, even though it's hard, complicated, much more than artificial intelligence gone haywire. He holds steady, then. ] I’m sorry I didn't.
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Markus wishes he could halve that burden and sling a part of it onto his own shoulders. Or even just the tiniest sliver, the smallest degree, to remove it from the other man if it meant that he could feel steadier on his feet, even imperceptibly. Conversation might be all he can manage; concessions, emotions, regret, memory that circles over and over in one’s mind like a restless predator. But giving life to them with words can make them tangible, make them more present — and as they walk down the skypark trail in the wretched heat of the New Amsterdam summer, perhaps with some small miracle they might leave some of those shadows behind, like footsteps pressed into loam.]
I would’ve liked to have known the truth from the start. [He won’t lie about that. After this world’s disastrous experience with AI life, after having left his own still in the lurch, the interest is a poignant one for Markus. As if he might divine the best route for himself to take, based on the failures of others. Like there might be something illuminating in these histories; advice unspoken, a clearer path. A warning.
And yet—]
But I was a stranger. A man who called himself an android, when all you could associate with the term were experiences still too raw to share with someone you’d just met.
[A highly personal story, a retelling that still seems to shake Fitz’s core. He can’t blame him, and he definitely can’t really be upset with him.]
Daisy and I aren’t unfriendly with each other, you should know. Even if our initial meeting was less than ideal. Take that seed of hope and latch onto it for now, the potential that your friends might learn to see it as something… not so cut and dry, not so black and white. [He mulls over his next statement, trying to apply the right words to his meaning.] I don’t ever want to be like Elysian, and I hope to never give the impression that I should be any world's version of it. I always hope to be a better example to anyone who has a troublesome history with AIs.
[And finally, all that being said:] Thank you for telling me everything.
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Thank you. [ faint again, still walking through the skypark on autopilot, as if the world around them has blurred, nothing but greens and light filtering this strange and intimate moment. Fitz does that sometimes. A focused single-mindedness that obscures all but the task or person in his sightline: Markus, offering him something he can't reject, no matter how much the self-punishment might satisfy the destructive impulses rolling around in his head. ]
It's only you who I've — well, Jemma, obviously, and Daisy was there — but you're the only one I've told the lot of it. [ Ah. Hastily, he adds: ] As I remember it. [ Memory takes a lot of poetic license, he thinks. Can't recall who said that. Fitz only knows he can't be trusted any longer, not with memory and not with this (despite this is the essential truth of what happened; it's hard for him to know that). ] You listening, everything you've said, what you're saying, you — it means a lot to me.
[ Fitz exhales, working two fingers under the collar of his shirt and brushing over the bandages there. ]
You are a good example, you know. Not just of AI's. Of all the examples. [ a tug at his collar, slight frustration over the effort of this. Trying to find the right words. Markus deserves the closest ones he can find, whatever he can string together to convey what he means. ] Of people. [ a beat. ] Only you don't have to be. Not all the time. I mean, that's a lot to ask of someone who's more than a — than an idea. [ His pace quickens, as if he's overstepped in saying that. ] You probably know that. Just. If you don't. [ an aborted shrug. ] I liked hearing about where you worked, what you get up to, before we were caught up in this again. [ He frees his hand from his collar, sweeping it across the nearby fixtures (a floral sculpture, a cluster of benches and trees, shading other wanderers). ] As a friend. As your friend. [ dropping his hands at his side. ] That's all.
[ Reiterated with greater confidence than before. Maybe if he can offer Markus a small reassurance (attention, companionship, honesty), he can allow this friendship, regardless of whether he deserves it or not. ]
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Even if Markus has a tendency to make that a lopsided exchange at best.
Because the talk of being an example — about not always having to be an example — doesn’t quite bring him unease, but it dredges up a part of him that’s hooked so deeply into duty, into obligation, into pressing forward for a purpose higher than his own, that makes it hard to think of himself as anything else. He is still all calmness to Fitz’ nervous energy, but there’s a hitch in his own words this time.]
I appreciate it, but— [A pause, readjusting his thought process, verbiage chosen carefully.] But I’m what others need to me to be, when they need me to be it. Especially when it comes to friends.
[Reaffirmation, the tug of a smile that he forces to not look apologetic in any way possible. But he affords Fitz the honesty he deserves.]
Just a part of who I am. It was that way back in Detroit, too. [Another hand stuffed into a pocket, a casual sort of air he doesn’t quite align to.] But if you’re signing yourself up to be someone I can complain to about the difficulties living in a human body, then I won’t say no.
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Lightly, he knocks his fist against Markus' shoulder, more friendly than comforting. Fitz worries that something softer would be rebuffed, just like his statements seconds earlier. ]
If that's what you want. [ Who is he to deny that? A part of who Markus is, like Fitz's earth-shaking, heart-shattering devotion. A more clinical assessment is arranged and metered out. ] Sounds like a tough way to live, when people need different things. Yourself included. Dunno if I'd call it sustainable. [ then, as if brushing it off. ] Maybe that's just the scientist in me.
[ the logic side of his brain, throwing around terms like "sustainable" and wondering if you can divvy up yourself that much without losing pieces along the way. ]
You know I'll always answer, if it's you calling, at any rate.
[ a purposeful redirect. He'd like to field more than complaints, if he can. ]
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He finds he can’t do the latter, not completely. That Fitz has unwound so much of himself before him, that should allow him at least the same in return — if even by a small amount. His shoulder jostles a little with the friendly gesture, his grin tilting lopsided.]
Unsustainable? Maybe not. But sometimes it isn’t a matter of sustainability, only necessity that you keep pushing forward for reasons that are beyond yourself.
[But even so, the offer does not go unnoticed nor under appreciated.]
That being said, I know that I can rely on you. And I appreciate it more than you know.
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Not sustainable. Necessary.
Repaying all of his vulnerability and concessions with one admission of his own, Markus gives a fraction, enough for the moment. Then he turns the conversation back on Fitz, terming him a known quantity, proven to be reliable despite all the evidence to the contrary. It makes his chest ache. People here as warm as his team, their specific configuration of atoms and memory only possible in this multiversal hub, and destined to blink out of this reality, by force or by choice.
We don’t need a martyr, he thinks, and forces the words to stay in his throat. Maybe they do. Maybe they will. The best causes always have one. If the time comes, if it’s necessary — ]
I know enough. [ His mouth curves, smile slight and sad. There nonetheless, persisting. ] You’re good at saying it. Showing it. [ He looks askance at Markus. ] And it means a lot. When it’s you.
[ clearing his throat, then. That’s enough sincerity for one day, isn’t it? ]