Caprica fic: a fork in the road
a fork in the road [Caprica, Daniel, Joseph, gen/pre-slash, G, 1,310 words, spoilers for the pilot. For aurora_84, prompts: beginnings, sharp.]
"It will get easier," Daniel says softly, flicking ash into the ashtray they're sharing. It's overflowing, though they've been here less than an hour, and the air is bitter and heavy, but it doesn't give Daniel pause. Things that used to matter, don't.
"I didn't expect platitudes from you." Joseph is angry. The pulse in the side of his neck, not quite hidden by his stiff shirt collar, is throbbing too fast and hard. He's tired too, tell-tale charcoal bruises under his eyes, and Daniel suspects his anger is weariness fueled. Sometimes it's easier to be angry than to feel anything else. Safer to let anger ride roughshod over all the less simple emotions, the ones that can hurt.
Daniel doesn't take Joseph for a man who wants to chose the safe or easy option.
The waitress tops up their coffee cups silently. She does so automatically, familiar with their almost daily routine. The menu on the wall claims they only use the finest Aerilon mountain coffee beans here, but Daniel can't tell the difference beneath the acrid taste of smoke in his mouth. He needs to give up smoking again. Just, not yet.
Daniel waits for the waitress to leave before he answers. "I'm not doling out platitudes. I'm not even talking about losing Shannon." He wouldn't listen if anyone tried to tell him that losing Zoe will get easier. He doesn't want it to be easier, doesn't want to lose the sharpness of the pain for fear his memories will soften and age, for fear he'll lose her along with them. He understands Joseph, like no one else can. "I'm talking about Shannon in the virtual world. It will get easier for her to deal with her new form of existence."
Joseph sips his coffee without waiting for it to cool. His shoulders sag and he looks defeated. "I'm scared to go back in," he admits, and Daniel wants to reach out. He picks up his own cup instead. Gloves aren't the only barrier. "But how can I leave her alone? My little girl, my baby, so scared. How can I live knowing that she's scared and alone? That it's my fault. That she's there because I'm weak and can't bear to live without her." There's a stuttered catch in Joseph's voice that Daniel recognizes. He's heard it in his own voice, every time he's spoken of Zoe.
Daniel swallows. Remembers the moment he saw Zoe across the club, the way his gut clenched with the need to protect her and hold her. "There is an alternative," he says, surprising himself. He doesn't make spur of the moment decisions. He's built his empire on making the right decisions, ones pondered over and carefully considered, discussed with people he trusts. But Joseph's grief is as heavy as the smoke-filled air and so entwined with his own that it over-rides Daniel's normal rules.
Joseph doesn't ask questions. He merely raises an eyebrow and waits for Daniel to continue. There is a lot between them that is said without words.
Daniel leans forward and speaks slowly, clearly, so there is no mistake as to what he is offering. "I can make your avatar permanent. Make it real, everything that you are. And that you, that version of you, can stay with Shannon."
Joseph looks startled. Daniel's caught him unaware, and for a moment everything is vivid on his face, loss and fear battling faith and hope. Then he shuts down. "That is a crazy idea," he says flatly.
Daniel leans back again. Looks out the window and watches people walking by, mundane lives. Then back at Joseph. A man who can never be merely mundane, no matter what choices he makes. "Crazier than your daughter still existing in a virtual world? We can't define life the way we did when we were boys; the world is changing too fast. Clinging to old ideas will only mean we'll be left behind."
Joseph pulls out another cigarette. Daniel takes it from him automatically and lights it from his own. It's oddly intimate, but then they've become intimate in a way Daniel isn't accustomed, even with his own family. Especially with his family. These meetings are no great secret, but Daniel hasn't mentioned them to Amanda. Not because he hates her; he doesn't. He did, for a while, hated her as though she'd killed Zoe with her own hands. Now the hatred has dissipated, it's left nothing. A strange emptiness where there used to be affection, and before that love. He can accept her touch, but he can't reach out to her, and he can't talk to her. It makes him all the more grateful for this strange bond he's formed with Joseph.
"Not crazier, no," Joseph replies eventually, when Daniel has almost forgotten his own question. "The gods know everything has become crazy. But is that any reason to continue, to go further? To push and push until we become people our grandparents wouldn't recognize?"
Daniel is confident now. This is a speech he's given, but it isn't merely a speech to him; it's the creed by which he lives and works and breathes. "The gods expect us to explore our limits, to find new limits when we break through old ones, to work out our own right and wrong. It's the reason we have free will and rational thought. We have to find our own paths and follow them wherever they lead. We're adventurers. We always have been, always will. We need to know, need to find new quests and ask new questions whenever we answer old ones. If we stopped, we wouldn't be humans any more. We'd be no better than the programmed drones I create. Imagine a world inhabited solely by drones."
Joseph gives a wry laugh and shakes his head. Not in disagreement, Daniel thinks. More like a man who's reaching a fork in his own path and is hesitating over his next step, telling himself to be cautious but knowing he wants to take the dangerous path. "Sometimes I think the monotheists have the easier path," Joseph says. "Being told right from wrong. Not being allowed to stray from that narrow path."
"You might want to be careful where, and to whom, you say such things." Especially with the public outcry against the Soldiers of the One, Daniel thinks, but doesn't say. Joseph is no fool.
"I can trust you," Joseph says, and Daniel wonders at his choice of wording. Wonders too at the ease with which Joseph has become part of his life, someone he trusts. Daniel is not normally a man who gives his trust easily or quickly. If he believed in destiny, he would think that is what this is, their chance encounter leading to this friendship that is more than any friendship Daniel's known. But he doesn't believe in destiny or anything that takes away man's choice, so he chooses to believe that he simply made the right decisions that day, and so did Joseph, and this is how they have come to be.
His coffee's grown cold, and it's time he left. He wants to start work on Joseph's avatar. He knows the answer, even though he suspects Joseph doesn't yet; he's a father, and he will do anything for his daughter. It's as simple and complex as that. So Daniel will have all the information ready to download into the avatar the moment Joseph gives his answer.
"Call me," he says as he gets up and waves for the check. He lets his hand rest on Joseph's shoulder. Reassurance, though for which of them he's not sure.
Joseph's smile is real. "I will," he says, and places his gloved hand over Daniel's for a moment. Daniel absorbs the comfort, and for the first time in too long his own smile is genuine.
//
"It will get easier," Daniel says softly, flicking ash into the ashtray they're sharing. It's overflowing, though they've been here less than an hour, and the air is bitter and heavy, but it doesn't give Daniel pause. Things that used to matter, don't.
"I didn't expect platitudes from you." Joseph is angry. The pulse in the side of his neck, not quite hidden by his stiff shirt collar, is throbbing too fast and hard. He's tired too, tell-tale charcoal bruises under his eyes, and Daniel suspects his anger is weariness fueled. Sometimes it's easier to be angry than to feel anything else. Safer to let anger ride roughshod over all the less simple emotions, the ones that can hurt.
Daniel doesn't take Joseph for a man who wants to chose the safe or easy option.
The waitress tops up their coffee cups silently. She does so automatically, familiar with their almost daily routine. The menu on the wall claims they only use the finest Aerilon mountain coffee beans here, but Daniel can't tell the difference beneath the acrid taste of smoke in his mouth. He needs to give up smoking again. Just, not yet.
Daniel waits for the waitress to leave before he answers. "I'm not doling out platitudes. I'm not even talking about losing Shannon." He wouldn't listen if anyone tried to tell him that losing Zoe will get easier. He doesn't want it to be easier, doesn't want to lose the sharpness of the pain for fear his memories will soften and age, for fear he'll lose her along with them. He understands Joseph, like no one else can. "I'm talking about Shannon in the virtual world. It will get easier for her to deal with her new form of existence."
Joseph sips his coffee without waiting for it to cool. His shoulders sag and he looks defeated. "I'm scared to go back in," he admits, and Daniel wants to reach out. He picks up his own cup instead. Gloves aren't the only barrier. "But how can I leave her alone? My little girl, my baby, so scared. How can I live knowing that she's scared and alone? That it's my fault. That she's there because I'm weak and can't bear to live without her." There's a stuttered catch in Joseph's voice that Daniel recognizes. He's heard it in his own voice, every time he's spoken of Zoe.
Daniel swallows. Remembers the moment he saw Zoe across the club, the way his gut clenched with the need to protect her and hold her. "There is an alternative," he says, surprising himself. He doesn't make spur of the moment decisions. He's built his empire on making the right decisions, ones pondered over and carefully considered, discussed with people he trusts. But Joseph's grief is as heavy as the smoke-filled air and so entwined with his own that it over-rides Daniel's normal rules.
Joseph doesn't ask questions. He merely raises an eyebrow and waits for Daniel to continue. There is a lot between them that is said without words.
Daniel leans forward and speaks slowly, clearly, so there is no mistake as to what he is offering. "I can make your avatar permanent. Make it real, everything that you are. And that you, that version of you, can stay with Shannon."
Joseph looks startled. Daniel's caught him unaware, and for a moment everything is vivid on his face, loss and fear battling faith and hope. Then he shuts down. "That is a crazy idea," he says flatly.
Daniel leans back again. Looks out the window and watches people walking by, mundane lives. Then back at Joseph. A man who can never be merely mundane, no matter what choices he makes. "Crazier than your daughter still existing in a virtual world? We can't define life the way we did when we were boys; the world is changing too fast. Clinging to old ideas will only mean we'll be left behind."
Joseph pulls out another cigarette. Daniel takes it from him automatically and lights it from his own. It's oddly intimate, but then they've become intimate in a way Daniel isn't accustomed, even with his own family. Especially with his family. These meetings are no great secret, but Daniel hasn't mentioned them to Amanda. Not because he hates her; he doesn't. He did, for a while, hated her as though she'd killed Zoe with her own hands. Now the hatred has dissipated, it's left nothing. A strange emptiness where there used to be affection, and before that love. He can accept her touch, but he can't reach out to her, and he can't talk to her. It makes him all the more grateful for this strange bond he's formed with Joseph.
"Not crazier, no," Joseph replies eventually, when Daniel has almost forgotten his own question. "The gods know everything has become crazy. But is that any reason to continue, to go further? To push and push until we become people our grandparents wouldn't recognize?"
Daniel is confident now. This is a speech he's given, but it isn't merely a speech to him; it's the creed by which he lives and works and breathes. "The gods expect us to explore our limits, to find new limits when we break through old ones, to work out our own right and wrong. It's the reason we have free will and rational thought. We have to find our own paths and follow them wherever they lead. We're adventurers. We always have been, always will. We need to know, need to find new quests and ask new questions whenever we answer old ones. If we stopped, we wouldn't be humans any more. We'd be no better than the programmed drones I create. Imagine a world inhabited solely by drones."
Joseph gives a wry laugh and shakes his head. Not in disagreement, Daniel thinks. More like a man who's reaching a fork in his own path and is hesitating over his next step, telling himself to be cautious but knowing he wants to take the dangerous path. "Sometimes I think the monotheists have the easier path," Joseph says. "Being told right from wrong. Not being allowed to stray from that narrow path."
"You might want to be careful where, and to whom, you say such things." Especially with the public outcry against the Soldiers of the One, Daniel thinks, but doesn't say. Joseph is no fool.
"I can trust you," Joseph says, and Daniel wonders at his choice of wording. Wonders too at the ease with which Joseph has become part of his life, someone he trusts. Daniel is not normally a man who gives his trust easily or quickly. If he believed in destiny, he would think that is what this is, their chance encounter leading to this friendship that is more than any friendship Daniel's known. But he doesn't believe in destiny or anything that takes away man's choice, so he chooses to believe that he simply made the right decisions that day, and so did Joseph, and this is how they have come to be.
His coffee's grown cold, and it's time he left. He wants to start work on Joseph's avatar. He knows the answer, even though he suspects Joseph doesn't yet; he's a father, and he will do anything for his daughter. It's as simple and complex as that. So Daniel will have all the information ready to download into the avatar the moment Joseph gives his answer.
"Call me," he says as he gets up and waves for the check. He lets his hand rest on Joseph's shoulder. Reassurance, though for which of them he's not sure.
Joseph's smile is real. "I will," he says, and places his gloved hand over Daniel's for a moment. Daniel absorbs the comfort, and for the first time in too long his own smile is genuine.
//