He clasps his hands in front of his forehead, elbows leaning on Powell's rotten chest, and takes a terribly deep sigh.
"Spirit," he murmurs, "you came for a confessional. The least I can do is be truthful."
...
"Pain has been the color of my whole life. When I was a child, the source of it was my parents and my brothers. I would hide from them in my sister's room, as the rest of us boys were packed into the other bedroom. I was always closer to her than the others. More like her. When we left for the ministry, it was as much because of our calling as it was to escape. Seminary was only a little better. The best decades of my life were spent as a hospital chaplain, ministering to the disabled and offering relief to the sick and dying. And after that was the war, and then that awful ship--if you know what it is like to break, you must know what it feels like to--to feel..."
He clutches at his ribcage.
"... My heart, my body, my mind--all of it shattered in that place. The Village, what Number 2 did, it was all taking advantage of that. The Korean War and the ship was all impersonal and senseless violence and all the aftershocks of that. Number 2 took the time to break you along where your cracks already were. And much of that was... was merely turning your eyes to truths about yourself that you were always too frightened to face. Oh, h-he carved up my brain and fried my mind. He made my senses into liars and my dreams into reality. He poisoned our food. He locked me all alone in all-white rooms. He invaded my home. He attempted to force me into idolatry and blasphemy every day. And yet, more than all of that... he showed me how desperately I have failed to be everything I tried to be. What I must be, as a servant of Him."
He lowers his hands. Turns to Powell and his bloody face and torn throat. The least he can do is confront, with both of his eyes, the mess he has created.
"The old Hawkeye and Powell... both of them were my fault, and I will live with that forever. I know now why I have never swayed a crowd. Why I have never held any gravitas or charisma, always being mistaken for absent even by those who loved me as a friend. I am not good. I am not a good priest, and I am not a good man. I have never been, and I cannot be. No good deed will change what I am in my nature: a viper. And I know where I am going when everything is done."
He scrubs at his eye and turns, just a little, eyes still cast resolutely downwards. Towards the vines and roots bursting from between the stone.
"And yet I cannot abandon love. Perhaps I've thought about it here and there, and sometimes it's held a lot of weight, but it's never been a lasting thought. It's never seemed appropriate. As a child, I loved my family. At the hospitals, I loved the patients and the staff. I loved the 4077th, and many of my fellow voyagers through the ship and the Village. How could I stop caring when we were all in such pain? What would that have helped? How could I answer His call if I stopped? Spirit, I've been in agony my whole life because I could not help but love at least one of my neighbors. And I will always happily be that fool.
"The problem is--I don't know what good it's doing anymore."
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cw implied child abuse, inpatient psychiatric stuff and medical & religious abuse, injury/gore ment
Date: 2024-11-29 08:36 am (UTC)He clasps his hands in front of his forehead, elbows leaning on Powell's rotten chest, and takes a terribly deep sigh.
"Spirit," he murmurs, "you came for a confessional. The least I can do is be truthful."
...
"Pain has been the color of my whole life. When I was a child, the source of it was my parents and my brothers. I would hide from them in my sister's room, as the rest of us boys were packed into the other bedroom. I was always closer to her than the others. More like her. When we left for the ministry, it was as much because of our calling as it was to escape. Seminary was only a little better. The best decades of my life were spent as a hospital chaplain, ministering to the disabled and offering relief to the sick and dying. And after that was the war, and then that awful ship--if you know what it is like to break, you must know what it feels like to--to feel..."
He clutches at his ribcage.
"... My heart, my body, my mind--all of it shattered in that place. The Village, what Number 2 did, it was all taking advantage of that. The Korean War and the ship was all impersonal and senseless violence and all the aftershocks of that. Number 2 took the time to break you along where your cracks already were. And much of that was... was merely turning your eyes to truths about yourself that you were always too frightened to face. Oh, h-he carved up my brain and fried my mind. He made my senses into liars and my dreams into reality. He poisoned our food. He locked me all alone in all-white rooms. He invaded my home. He attempted to force me into idolatry and blasphemy every day. And yet, more than all of that... he showed me how desperately I have failed to be everything I tried to be. What I must be, as a servant of Him."
He lowers his hands. Turns to Powell and his bloody face and torn throat. The least he can do is confront, with both of his eyes, the mess he has created.
"The old Hawkeye and Powell... both of them were my fault, and I will live with that forever. I know now why I have never swayed a crowd. Why I have never held any gravitas or charisma, always being mistaken for absent even by those who loved me as a friend. I am not good. I am not a good priest, and I am not a good man. I have never been, and I cannot be. No good deed will change what I am in my nature: a viper. And I know where I am going when everything is done."
He scrubs at his eye and turns, just a little, eyes still cast resolutely downwards. Towards the vines and roots bursting from between the stone.
"And yet I cannot abandon love. Perhaps I've thought about it here and there, and sometimes it's held a lot of weight, but it's never been a lasting thought. It's never seemed appropriate. As a child, I loved my family. At the hospitals, I loved the patients and the staff. I loved the 4077th, and many of my fellow voyagers through the ship and the Village. How could I stop caring when we were all in such pain? What would that have helped? How could I answer His call if I stopped? Spirit, I've been in agony my whole life because I could not help but love at least one of my neighbors. And I will always happily be that fool.
"The problem is--I don't know what good it's doing anymore."