Sometimes, I feel like going down I'm so disconnected

[osreborn]

WHO: Norman Osborn and you!
WHERE: NoHoPE
WHEN: Visiting hours (let's say between 1 and 4) on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Specify the time and date in your comment.
WARNINGS: Hmm.
SUMMARY: Isn't it obvious?
FORMAT: Whatever is your pleasure.


It wasn't even a week since he'd been incarcerated in his hospital. Norman was far more stable than he had been when he was arrested thanks to the medications he was inundated with -- pills he tried not to swallow, injections that he couldn't avoid. He was calmer thanks to sedation, but the other affects would take longer to kick in fully. His body rebelled, trying to fight them.

He scratched at his neck, chewed his nails, slept poorly. One of the worst things about being here was the inability to have private conversations; Norman was missing them already.

The other things he might miss weren't things he would ever consciously admit to himself.

Comments

[osreborn]

"It's all right, Terra. I understand. There are a lot of stories out there, sometimes all you can do is listen to what your mind is telling you. Would I have any reason to trick you? Really? Did I use you for anything bad?"

He looked at her, earnestly. He was watching her face, observing it for any change of expression, any potential weakness. He already had a hook in; he was going to pursue it.

[diesarock]

The more he watched her, the less able she was to meet his gaze; Terra's face was turned down, away, and the straight and unyielding sense of certainty she'd carried in was falling away.

"No..." He hadn't. Times Square aside, where everyone had seemed just as confused as Terra felt, they'd only helped people. But even if he hadn't made her do anything bad, it didn't mean he wouldn't use her, or have some reason to trick her. For as many months as she'd worked under him, he still didn't know the full extent of her power—she'd done her best to protect the secret of her heritage and her other face from him, and the rest of the team. But wasn't it possible he suspected? That he was just waiting for her to slip up and reveal the full fury of her power?

Who was right? Who was wrong? How could she know for certain? If there was one thing Terra did know, it was that she couldn't trust her own judgment. In profile, the tight knit of her eyebrows was mostly hidden behind her hair, but there was a tense pull to her cheek and the worrying of her lower lip. She didn't even know what to say.

[osreborn]

"There -- already their arguments fail to hold water. I've been a hero to this city for a year and a half; obviously, that was too much for some people. They wanted to force me out. You can't deny you haven't heard them planning, can you? They've been scheming, aiming to destroy... us."

He shook his head, casting his eyes downward. In the time Norman had known Terra, she had seemed to him a pliable resource. Innocent and naive. He knew that she would listen to his words, as long as they came out in the right order.

"And look at where we are now."

[diesarock]

It was times like these that Terra missed most her companions among the Returners. Even if they always told her she needed to make decisions for herself, at least it was easier to see that they were good people doing good things, fighting against evil people who were much more obvious about it. Who was she supposed to believe in now?

She looked up then, a small frown pulling at her features. "Where... we are?"

[osreborn]

His eyes broke away from hers for just a moment, before returning to them. Norman allowed himself a sigh, shaking his head slightly before rubbing his temple briefly -- a sweeping gesture across his brow.

"Broken apart. Disassembled. Scattered apart, like a puzzle once its swept off the table."

[diesarock]

There was nothing Terra could think of to say to that. Her gaze once again turned to the side in discomfort, with tense uncertainty returning to the clench of her jaw and the shrug of her shoulders. Confused and conflicted once again.

[osreborn]

Folding his hands in his lap, Norman watched her in silence, waiting for minutes to pass before he spoke again. His voice was calm and gentle.

"What are you going to do now?"

[diesarock]

Here it was easy to answer; Terra shrugged her bare shoulders once, a careless sort of thing, and shook her head. "I don't know," she said with the strange sort of confidence only brought by a frequent ignorance. "I haven't really... thought about it yet."

[osreborn]

"I suggest you think about it soon," Norman said, eyebrows raising. "There are people who will prey on your indecision. People like Tony Stark; he may try to plant in your head that he wants to help you -- but he wants nothing more from you than what I'm sure he'll tell you I wanted. The Avengers are not people you want to trust."

[diesarock]

Once again Terra looked up with some measure of surprise, eyes wide and shallow wrinkles forming across the pale plane of forehead. "I never understood that. Why... both sides carried the same name." As for the rest, it really didn't matter if she trusted Norman or not, did it? The longer she lived in this world, the more it felt like she couldn't trust anyone.

[osreborn]

"Where I come from, my Avengers were the real Avengers. The legal Avengers, if you will; working with the law, and the government. Even here, that was my goal. Someone had to lead an organized team, and no one else was stepping up to the plate."

He smiled. "I was doing what no one else could be bothered to do. Does that help clear things up?"