Tuesday Afternoon: The Not-so-Abandoned-Warehouse

[badassprodigy]

Barry had avoided the warehouse for a total of a day. For the better part of the weekend, he had been holed up here watching friends go through some of the more horrible things that he could have ever imagined. There were of course bright moments that happened as well but the overall horror was outshining those moments.

Which is probably why Barry decided to call home.

"Dude!"

Jeremy's face was all smiles. "What the fuck man? You finally decided to give your best buddy a call after weeks of ignoring me?"

"Shut the fuck up," Barry retorted with a smirk. "I send you emails all the time."

"Yeah but who the fuck has time to read that?" Jeremy snarked back. "So what's the reason for the call?"

Barry paused a moment, his grin fading. "I don't think I ever thanked you."

Jeremy's expression went to immediate puzzlement. "What?"

"I never thanked you. For smacking me around whenever I was doing dickish things to people when we were kids."

Jeremy's expression never changed. "Dude. What the fuck are you talking about? You're being like... serious and shit. What the fuck happened?"

And it all came out. Barry told Jeremy everything. About Eleanor and her sub. The away team's trip to Rapture. Especially all the ugly things that had been done just because no one gave a shit about the consequences. Eleanor. Little Sisters. Big Daddies/Mr. Bubbles. Splicers. Cults. All of it.

Jeremy's jaw had dropped and his mouth was hanging open by the end of it. "Duuuuuuuuuude..."

"I know. Anyway. Part of me wonders if I had been there what I would have done. I'd like to think I would have stopped the experiments, not allowed little girls to become monsters but... honestly I think I would have gone along with it."

"DUDE!"

"If I didn't have you as a best friend."

"What?"

"You were always there. Telling me to do the right thing. Most of the time. Calling me on my shit when I was being a fucking dick."

Jeremy snorted in amusement. "Dude you weren't always that bad. You knew what needed to be done. You just needed a fucking push sometimes. Or a kick to the fucking 'nads."

Oh, Jeremy. It always came back to the gonads, didn't it?

"Yeah. But you were the one doing the pushing. And I just wanted to say thanks."

Jeremy grinned. "You're welcome. Now are we done being fucking wusses now? Shit. I think my shlong inverted just talking to you."

"Fuck you," Barry said with a laugh. "How are things with Roxie?"

"Good! She's fucking awesome. We're going to see meta for Guardians for the thirtieth time this weekend. You should come!"

"Eh. We'll see. I might have something planned with Elsa."

"Ooooo. Elsa. You finally fucking kiss her or what?"

Barry's face betrayed any response he could have had.

"DUDE! I SAW THAT!"

"Fuck you!" Barry retorted. "I don't know what you're fucking talking about!"

"BARRY KISSED A GIIIIIIIIRRRRRL! BARRY KISSED A GIIIIIIIIRRRRRL! BARRY KISSED A GIIIIIIIIRRRRRL! Do you LOOOOOOOOOOOOVE her?"

"Fuck you!" Barry said half laughing. "It was just a kiss."

"BARRY KISSED A GIIIIIIIIRRRRRL! BARRY KISSED A GIIIIIIIIRRRRRL!"

"I take everything back," Barry said shaking his head in amusement. "You're an asshole."

Jeremy had no response. He was too busy making kissy noises at his phone.

"Fuck you," Barry said as his way of saying goodbye and disconnected.

After the call he sat back and shook his head in amusement. Suddenly the warehouse didn't seem as grim anymore.

Five minutes later he was back to his regular self and running five experiments at once as he started building yet another project.

[Open door, open post]

Comments

[notaweenie.livejournal.com]

"Well... then you're lucky," Barry said with a grim look. "And I hope to fucking God you don't ever have to make that choice but if you plan on being a super hero you might want to think about these things."

[spin_kick_snap]

"What makes you think I haven't?" Kathy asked, voice small. "I'm just...I'm a girl from a mostly normal world. No aliens, no monsters, no insane gadgets that rewrite reality. The few superheroes that have shown up in my world fight off the regular gangs in LA. It's not like a comic or a video game, where death has no meaning. In my world, a handful of teenagers can't just decide to leave with a little girl because she's being mistreated and drug addicts can be dangerous, but that's not a reason to kill them."

She spread her hands, willing Barry to understand. "I know that I don't have the first clue about what happened down there. That's why I came here, to ask. Anders doesn't want to talk about it and I don't want to force him to. So...I thought...maybe you could help me understand. Help me reconcile things. That's all."

[notaweenie.livejournal.com]

"Well then do you understand now?" Barry asked deflating a little bit. "You're not going to judge Anders for what he did down there are you? Because he doesn't need that right now."

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy didn't, not really. But she also wasn't going to ask again and risk making Barry angrier. She got the gist that they were in real, life-threatening danger and that was enough.

"I knew that Anders wasn't the type to kill without some kind of reason," she said. "That would be the only reason I'd really judge him. I mean, it's not even my place to judge him. Or anybody, for that matter. I just wanted a better idea of where his lines are drawn. Get a better idea of what he'd gone through to get to that point. His explanations...didn't really cover it."

She swallowed. "Sorry I bugged you about this. I should have just assumed...I don't know. That everything happened for a reason, I guess."

[notaweenie.livejournal.com]

"I wouldn't assume that at all," Barry said. "It's good that you are asking this question but I think now I'm even more worried about you running around out there playing hero."

[spin_kick_snap]

"I'm not playing!" Kathy flared, balling her fists at her sides. Her eyes jumped to his, the first time they'd met since she'd started the conversation. "This isn't some kind of game for me, Barry!"

[notaweenie.livejournal.com]

"I know it's not. Bad choice of words," Barry said seriously. "I know you're doing this to help people. I'm just wondering if you're prepared to make the right decision when the time comes."

[spin_kick_snap]

"Why does killing someone have to be the right decision? You know most police officers don't kill people and I'm less than that! I'm a costumed vigilante who leaves bad guys tied to telephone poles with zip ties and a gymnastic ribbons!"

She just couldn't imagine looking at what used to be a living, breathing person with thoughts and feelings and a whole future and knowing that they were dead by her hands. Or feet. Or...whatever.

[notaweenie.livejournal.com]

"I didn't say it was the fucking right decision," Barry said calmly. "I'm saying you need to be prepared for it. What if we did a scenario? Suppose there was a super powered bad guy. More durable than the standard fucking purse snatcher. What if he had me in a chokehold and your non-lethal attacks wouldn't work? What would you do?"

[spin_kick_snap]

"Okay, so, let me get this straight. There's a supervillain, you can't get out of his grasp, you inexplicably don't have any weapons or anything on your person, and none of my attacks work? Then how the heck am I supposed to kill him in the first place? Do I have a gun for no reason than because this is a scenario that I'm supposed to default to killing in? Okay, and he's so durable that shooting him in the knee won't stop him and shooting him in the shoulder won't make him let go, and...what? He doesn't believe me if I go up and hold a gun to his temple and threaten him? Is this how the scenario is supposed to play out?"

Kathy couldn't eyeroll harder. The problem with scenarios like these were that they were always so stupid. They ignored reality in favor of weighing towards a predetermined outcome.

[notaweenie.livejournal.com]

"So you're telling me that there is no situation where you wouldn't have to take another person's life?" Barry asked and then shook his head. "Bullshit."

[spin_kick_snap]

"I'm not saying that," Kathy said, scowling. "But I can say that killing someone would be my very last resort and something only to be contemplated after all other avenues have been explored! And since I have abilities that the average person does not, I think I have more of a responsibility to come up with ways around taking another life, not less!"

This outlook was probably why she was on your Ethics Committee, Barry.

"Will I maybe one day be in a position where I have to make a snap decision about whether or not to kill someone? Possibly! I think this island makes it more likely than my night job in Baltimore, but, you never know. Maybe it'll happen. But that doesn't mean that I have to approach every problem like it's kill or be killed."