(Untitled)

[carefulwishes]

"And the precog?"

"Bring him in."

So Eden will. Did this particular precog paint her death? Yes. Is she a strong confident woman who won't let a little thing like that stop her? Yes. (A voice in her head whispers No, but that's the voice of her insecurities. She knows it well. She can ignore it. She has a job to do.) She hops the subway and keeps

Comments

[viridian_hue]

When Isaac opens the door, he looks like death warmed over--what else is new?--and he's covered in paint--again, standard--and for a long moment, all he can do is stare at her. Maybe it's not the same girl. Maybe it's just a weird body-double thing. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Heroin does weird things to the body, to the mind, he knows that. He could be hallucinating, giving that girl's face to someone who reminds him of her. Or something. Way to rationalize.

"Can I help you?" he finally asks.

[viridian_hue]

"Subway's murder," Isaac says, nodding a little, jiggling the foot on the ground, bare and his toes slap arhythmically against the concrete.

There's silence for a moment. He doesn't think he likes silence too much, it's too easy to pay attention to every nerve in his body screaming for another dose, just one more hit, and he's not ready to see any more blood when he opens his eyes again. So he just opens his mouth and lets the first question on his tongue fall out.

"So why did you come? Really?"

[carefulwishes]

Eden likes silence. You can watch people in it. It gives you time to think, to write and edit and polish your words. Sometimes it's even better than words.

"You didn't call and - God, I'm going to sound like a neurotic girlfriend - I got worried." Her smile fades. "But I...I'm not proud of this, but I'm here because I met someone today who mentioned you. It seemed like a sign." She looks at her feet, says softly, "Like the universe telling me I couldn't keep putting something off."

[viridian_hue]

Isaac shakes his head. "I've had neurotic girlfriends. You don't sound like one."

He rolls the words around in his head like marbles, thinking about them, letting them ping together and bounce apart. "Who mentioned me?" he asks.

[carefulwishes]

Eden pretends to think a moment. "Peter Petrelli." She watches Isaac. "He's like us. Or thinks he is."

[viridian_hue]

"Him," Isaac says, and there's something surly about it. "He's...I don't want to talk about him."

That's that, there's no arguing with that tone, and he scratches hard down his arm, raising a line of red blood with his nails.

[carefulwishes]

Eden's hand darts to the one scratching his arm and pulls it away - firm, but not too firm. He could break her grip if he wanted to.

"All right. We won't. We'll talk about how you can get the help you need." She looks up at him, her gaze searching for his. Sincere, confident, but knowing there are walls to overcome.

[viridian_hue]

He doesn't break her grip, but he looks away, sweat beading on his forehead. "I'm fine. I guess."

It's not the best reading of that line ever, but it's all he can muster. He doesn't feel fine.

[carefulwishes]

"If you have to guess that you're fine, you're not," Eden points out softly. (No matter how softly you speak, you're not being profound - just obvious, snaps her insecurities.)

[viridian_hue]

He sighs softly. "Look, I've been through rehab...three times now. I can't pray this away, no matter what my abuelita says, I can't break it, I can't will it away, I can't fix it. I get that you're concerned and all, and thanks, appreciate it. But there's no helping me. Not anymore. If anyone helps me, the visions go away. And I have to stop that, over there on my floor. So I can't be helped," he explains, and he sounds exhausted, utterly drained to the point of collapse. It's pathetic, he realises, but he doesn't care anymore.

[carefulwishes]

Eden swallows as she listens, nodding softly. She looks like she's listening, considering his words, because she knows how horrible it is not to be listened to.

"Isaac, I know about powers. I've used them and seen others use them. If they came from what you put into you, I'd only be able to persuade when I have a bottle of Scotch in me. These things we can do, they're tied to your soul. Not what keeps you from it. And in the long run, this stuff does.

"But you know that. Right?" An invitation to speak, to give another side, another opportunity for her to listen.

[viridian_hue]

"My soul's been bought by the witch," Isaac says bitterly. "My guardian angel didn't even get a chance."

The words hurt and he pulls his hand away from hers to start to scratch again restlessly, right at the bloodied part of his arm, smearing crimson around against the paint that previously stained the skin. It's almost abstract art, painfully created.

[carefulwishes]

"Stop that," she says - a request, sharply given, but not a command.

"You've given up on yourself," she states, but there's a light question, a nonverbal do I have that right? in there. "So certain you can't be fixed. So certain nothing can ever change."

[viridian_hue]

His hand stills. Isaac takes orders, apparently.

"I can't. I can't do it without the smack. I can't. And if I don't paint, I can't save anybody, can't fix anything. I can't even sketch without it. Nothing comes." He wipes the sweat from his upper lip, smearing the blood from his fingertips in a grotesque mustache.

[carefulwishes]

Eden watches him, frowning lightly.

"Can you save the world if you won't even try to save yourself?"

[viridian_hue]

"I...don't know," Isaac admits, shivering despite the sweat. "I don't know. I have to try." The last word breaks painfully and he swallows around it, trying to ignore how pathetic and ridiculous he thinks he sounds. It's really more desperate than anything else.