ingenue_bait | TLV IC Contact

My name is Laura, and I'm your temporary warden this month. I will help with whatever I can, should you need it.

If you want to tell me about yourself, I would be interested in hearing it, but it is not required.

I can think of nothing, short of my freedom, I would be tempted to ask of you.

Sending you home is not in my power, but I can help with smaller freedoms, like accessing restricted areas, if needed.

How have you been spending your time since your arrival?

That is no concern of yours, as long as you keep me jailed without cause or recourse.

I would like to make one thing abundantly clear: I am not your jailer. You can move about the ship as freely as you'd like, and I'd be more than happy to allow access to otherwise restricted areas.

We have a gym, a pool, fresh and free food, entertainment areas, a library, green spaces. We have places to practice religion, art, and music. You are encouraged to interact, to learn, and grow. Inmates have far more freedom than any prison I've ever been held in.

The barge is only as much a prison as you believe it to be.

Then in this spirit of CLARITY let me say this:

I do not now, nor will I ever, have any interest in the false baubles of freedom you dangle before me. I have seen too much of the world and lived too long to recognize it as anything but a prison, and you may design your trap as well as you please--it will not fool Erik.

And if that is too esoteric for you:

May I leave the Barge? Then it is a prison. Do I have a warden? Then it is a prison.

The world can be a cruel place. People do terrible things to one another.

I was kept in a cell for the first thirteen years of my life. One room, no bed, barely any contact. I was let out only to kill. I'm not telling you this to gain sympathy, but so that you understand where I'm coming from. I would not be - and am not - complicit in a system that is designed to be cruel.

And I know that people often make their own prisons out of the places they occupy, when it's all that they know, or think they deserve. I know that it's comfortable.

If you feel like coming out of your cabin and exploring the ship, let me know. If you want to stay in the cell of your own making, go ahead. Ultimately it's your choice.

[It's an interesting story, and Erik's curiosity is piqued, but he refuses to give in.]

Your implication being that should I wish to leave my room, I require your permission?

Absolutely not. You may move about the ship as you wish. I request that you let me know because I would like to walk with you, and on the chance that you need someone to open areas that you would like to visit but cannot.

I do not require your company. And I am hardly here on a pleasure cruise.

Do you want to be rehabilitated?

I have no need. Erik has been saved already.

Then why do you believe you are here?

Because either someone with more power than I have wants me here, or because there is no rhyme or reason to life or death.

I do not think those things are necessarily separate.

Others will tell you that you are here to be "rehabilitated," but they will not be able to tell you what that means. In theory inmates are chosen by the Admiral because he believes they can change in some way. In practice it does appear to be random.

I do not pretend to understand his motives, or even agree with them. But I do know that you can decide what you do with the time that you have while you are here. If what you need is to remain in your cabin, then that is what you should do.

Do you require food and water?

Do you mean are those biological necessities, or are you offering?

Are they necessities?

[Pause.]

As much as I often wish it were otherwise... yes.

Understood.

Thank you.

[From this morning forward, Laura will knock, leave a simple meal on a tray outside his door, and walk away. If the first one is eaten, she'll bring another later. If not, she'll dispose of it the next day and bring a fresh one.]

[He never answers, but sometimes the food is gone, sometimes it is not. There is no pattern--it simply has to do with whether Erik remembers he is hungry, and what mood he is in.]

Hello - this is Matt. I'm your warden this month; we haven't met before. I think we should change that.

[Erik's voice--if you have heard it before--sounds tired. Weak, almost.]

There is nothing you can offer Erik the previous two did not.

Maybe not, but are you sure?

Does no one respect the right of a man to die in peace?

Is that what you want?

TLV IC Contact

[backdated to a few days after the temp pairing post]

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