Completed Comfortably Numb

[Kristen Pirian]

THE ARMORY​

Kristen made it a point to visit Henk in the Armory after the day's classes were done. To sneak off there, if she had to; Proctors often waited in ambush to pounce upon unsuspecting Initiates either during their free period or after classes were done, to spring upon them some drudgery or to torment them in whatever way they were allowed and to call this "extra training."

Thankfully, Kristen didn't have much trouble. Ignatius, Sieglilly, and Zael were the unlucky ones who were caught by Proctors with tasks and training to assign, and Kristen was able to slink away and zip around a corner before stern eyes fell upon her too.

The Armory door creaked open. And Kristen poked her head inside.

"Henk? Are you still in here?"

Henk

 

[Henk]

Henk had spent the rest of the day polishing everything he could get his hands on in the Armory, and his hands felt like they were about to fall off any minute. That wasn't why Henk hated the job though; it was the smell of polish he couldn't stand. It made him lightheaded, and he already was after the fight he'd had earlier.

He was happy though. Henk was sure that had bumped that particular Proctor's opinion of Pirian a fair deal, and a boost in self-confidence was just what his sister-in-arms needed. He'd just replaced a sword back on the rack with a small cough when he heard the creak of the large door.

"Kristen? You shouldn't be in here. Wouldn't want another proctor to see us together and have us go another round." He smiled at her, quite cheekily. A joke from Henk? Maybe something had been knocked loose in the fight.

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

A bright red flush of embarrassment immediately colored Kristen's cheeks. She had come to understand that in certain areas of vernacular, "going another round" could have another meaning which did not relate at all to sparring and fighting. There were a few other Initiates around, all of whom had a raucous belly laugh at it, when she first learned this fact.

"What? No, no, no."

She waved off the subject and Henk's concern in one motion.

"And I know. I know. I shan't be long, and I would be so bold as to suggest that misfortune could not possibly be twice timely in a single day."

Kristen came in and, not wanting to tempt said misfortunes unnecessarily, shut the door behind herself.

"I just wanted to talk. Are you, by chance, feeling any better?"

Henk

 

[Henk]

Fought back a laugh at Kristen's deep blush in reaction to his words. He hadn't meant it as a double-entendre, of course, but he knew Pirian had been learning some lessons outside of combat too. Henk sometimes wished he participated in activities with the others more often, but his efforts to do so usually ended with him spectating.

Not to imply that he was bitter. Not in the least. Henk merely knew his place in the social hierarchy, so to speak.

"You suggest it to be so, and yet you so bravely tempt fate anyway. Truly you have the will of a dreadlord." Henk continued to tease, pulling down a breastplate to polish as Kristen closed the door and moved closer. The always rather stoic Henk was actually quite touched that she'd come to check on him; it was more than he expected.

"I'm as good as I'll get. My senses are back about me, but this armor polish drives me mad, the stench of it." He began wiping at the armor, biting his tongue for a moment before continuing. "You did exemplary, Kristen. I know that Proctor saw your strength in spades, even if he was less than pleased with me."

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

Kristen frowned a little, and though the gesture was small it struck at the heart of why she was here. The compliments he gave her felt unearned. They ate away at her in large chunks, whereas before, in the slow burning of the day leading up to sneaking into the Armory, her own misgivings had been a tiny but incessant gnawing.

She had had time to think about it. To assess her initial nervousness and her performance.

And to mull over Noel's advice to her. What it meant.

"Henk...after our fight, the Proctor said that you held back."

She held her right hand in her left. Squeezed. She wasn't so accustomed to asking questions of a more forward nature.

"Is that true?"

Henk

 

[Henk]

Ah, so that's what this was about...

It was true, more than a few of his blows, especially that last stomp to her midsection, were soft. Henk was sure that she hadn't needed the Proctor to tell her that though. Either way, it would nag at her, and why wouldn't it? Kristen wasn't the type to accept praise if she didn't feel she'd earned it.

Biting down on the inside of his cheek, Henk placed the armor he was polishing aside, eyes suddenly avoiding hers quite blatantly. "Partially. I came out swinging when the fight began." Granted, he'd been blinded at the time.

"I hate fighting you all, Kristen. Every time they make us spar until we're half dead, it feels so meaningless." Henk had no idea what had possessed him to speak so honestly about his feelings, but he meant what he said. Turning to Kristen, he spread his arms, the bruises on the exposed skin of his neck and chest line still visible.

"You're all my family, Pirian. If I hurt you, even enough that you aren't able to perform up to snuff, I would feel awful. So yes. I hold back, but not just on you."

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

Her heart went out to him, for the pain he felt—a pain not solely on his arms and neck. She was reminded greatly of Evangeline, especially so for how he viewed her and the rest of their peers as family. Eva was as much a part of House Pirian as any noble-blooded son or daughter bearing the name. Part of the family.

But she had to pursue what was bothering her.

So she sat down on the bench in the Armory. Leaned forward, elbows on her thighs. Her hands she was still wringing, slowly and nervously.

"Do you think it...helps me? If you hold back?"

Henk

 

[Henk]

The issue ran far deeper for Henk than he let show. It was so much more than fighting them. The other Initiates were the only family Henk had ever had, and they were treated as nothing but trained weapons. That's why Henk worked as hard as he did, and gave his missions everything he had: To protect his family.

It was silly, and Henk knew it wasn't a shared sentiment among the others. It was the way of thinking that kept him sane though, through all of this idiocy. Yet, it was clear that Pirian was wounded by the admission. Lowering into a seat, she pressed him further.

"You don't need my help, Kristen." He stated bluntly. "You're much stronger than you give yourself credit for. My ..." Teeth bit down on his lower lip. No, she was right. He couldn't make excuses, not to her, whom he'd put through so much today already.

"It was selfish of me, to pull my punches. My desire to see you unharmed is not worth playing with your pride. Forgive me, Kristen."

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

His apology was immediately disarming. What was she expecting? She couldn't quite say, but she reckoned that she would have to formulate a succinct rebuttal, wrangling the plethora of thoughts and contemplations on what she wanted and why she felt this way with some measure of brevity.

But she didn't need to. Henk seemed to understand where she was coming from. No excuses, no condescension, no indifference, no gloating. Just understanding.

She just wanted to get up and hug him.

So she did. Held him for a good long moment. Aside from Delaney, no one had truly shown to her any inkling of a feeling which could be called warm. Even in this new era of the Academy, it was still an overtly cold place.

"It's okay, Henk," she said. "Your heart is in the right place."

And then she separated from him.

"Are you friends with Noel, by any chance? Do you speak with her often?"

Henk

 

[Henk]

Henk had told no one of his emotions, not for a very long time. They made him weak, earned him nothing but punishments and scorn. To earn the title of Dreadlord, one needed to be a killer without reservation. But Henk hadn't chosen this path; It had been forced on him, and now the only way he could continue to be among those he cared about was to push the negative emotions down and continue on.

So when Kristen rose to her feet and hugged him, Henk held her tightly. For that one moment, he lowered the walls he so carefully kept up, and a deep sigh of relief left his throat as he relaxed against her. She slowly pulled away, leaving him with a smile more genuine than he'd worn in months.

"Thank you, Kristen. Sometimes, I lose faith."

Then she asked him about Noel, and a twinge of pain crossed his features.

Noel... in all of his time here, Noel was the only one who'd ever seen him as anything more than just Henk. It had only been for one night, but before all hell had broke loose at the ball... He'd felt alive. That sensation of butterflies in his stomach had haunted him ever since.

And Noel wanted to pretend it never happened.

"Well..." Henk cleared his throat, shifting his weight uncomfortably to one side. "She doesn't speak to me often anymore, no."

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

"Oh."

His response clearly wasn't what Kristen had been expecting. In her mind she'd a very simplistic, maybe even idealistic, notion of Henk and Noel and the level of their acquaintance after the Ball, and only just now was it revealed to her that this notion was...flatly wrong.

And it was awkward.

And that awkwardness showed through on the bashful pursing of her lips and the curling of her brows.

"I'm...so very sorry." Saying it felt oddly strange. Yes, oddly strange, for why should she feel so? The way the Academy warped what otherwise should have been normal reactions and emotions was both bizarre and fascinating.

"Well, um...never mind that then. The point I was attempting to make is this: I have been told on various occasions and in differing ways that I, too, should not hold back. That, if I wish to become strong, I should spare my opponents, and most certainly my foes, nothing. No quarter, no mercy—that such is the way of the Dreadlords."

And deeply she looked at him. Scrutinizing.

"I wanted to know what you thought of that. You have been here at the Academy far longer than I."

Henk

 

[Henk]

Awkward was a polite way of putting it, but Henk didn't blame Kristen in the least. It wasn't her fault, and anybody who'd seen the pair of them at the ball would have had some assumptions about his relationship with the notoriously icy woman.

"I'm at peace enough with it. It's okay."

A lie, but one with a silver modicum of truth within it.

She needn't beat around the bush with Henk. If it was Noel who had told her such things about the proper way to be a Dreadlord, it wouldn't surprise him a bit. Hell, what Kristen said was all true. To be the Dreadlord that Vel Anir wanted, you needed to have no mercy, to be borderline heartless. That was why Henk had no illusion that he would be around for very long after the looming graduation.

"I think... I may not be the best one to ask that question. I never wanted to be a Dreadlord. I wasn't given a choice in the matter, Kristen." Henk sighs, pushing his tongue into his cheek before stepping forward, reaching out and placing a hand on her shoulder. "If you want to be a Dreadlord, then that very well may be your path to power. To become a strong human being, to keep your soul and conscience... That is another thing entirely. That's what I aspire to. To do that you must hang onto that sliver of mercy. Sometimes it's all that keeps us human."

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

All of what Henk said after he placed his hand on her shoulder could well have come from Evangeline's own tongue. Holding on to something most precious, the keeping of a sacred fire, one's very own humanity, which was easy to extinguish and terribly hard to rekindle. Sage words. She heard them, yes.

But they did not take primacy. They did not capture her attention as much as what he said prior.

She looked at Henk bewilderment, as if she never would have expected to hear such a thing from him. Bewilderment, as well as a small and subtle hint of hurt.

"You don't...want to be a Dreadlord?"

Henk

 

[Henk]

It hadn't been Henk's desire to wound Kristen's feelings with the admission and to be sure it was a more complex statement than face value would have it. Still, no matter what he'd meant by his words, the twinge of pain in her eyes made the older Initiate wince as well.

"I don't want to be a trained killer, used as a tool for a government that stole me from my family. I don't want to but..." Henk's hand slid down her arm and fell back to his side as he craned his head, as if trying to jostle the right words loose. "You're also my only friends. Without everybody here I would be alone. I do not want that either. If there were some way I could be both, I would aim for that. As it stands, I will be a Dreadlord so that I may remain by the side of those who have been there for me when nobody else was."

He spoke not of the Academy, but of the Initiates. His brothers and sisters.

"We were given different paths, Kristen. You come from a cherished bloodline, and I am a bastard son whose choice was to fight or to die. That does not make you different than me, though. Our souls are the same."

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

Even in the midst of his explanation, Kristen had a difficult time processing what Henk was saying. It wasn't the idea of him wanting to stand by the friends he'd made, no, that part she could easily understand.

Our souls are the same.

"But...they're not."

Her brow was set in a hard, flat line, little furrows creasing the fair skin of her forehead. Her lips were parted just so, small visions of her white teeth glimpsed behind. Her eyes were scrutinizing, searching with increasing desperation to simply try to understand.

"You have a gift...and you don't want to use it."

Inside Kristen was a nine-year-old girl, abducted violently and suddenly from the Embassy in Anir Square, taken to a place where she thought she was never going to see her home nor her family again. Where she thought she was going to die and there was absolutely nothing she could do about it. A place where the feeling of fearful helplessness had been total.

And it was here that that little girl would've rejoiced if she had powers like Henk's.

She would have rejoiced if a man like Henk had saved her from Duresh, sparing her from ever being taken in the first place. But how could he have possibly even been there in the Embassy to protect her, this man like Henk, if he never wanted to use his gift and be a Dreadlord at all?

She couldn't understand.

Henk

 

[Henk]

"You have a gift...and you don't want to use it."

A gift. That's what Kristen called this... mutation... that made him so dangerous he wasn't allowed to know his Mother. It was a gift that decided what path he took in life before he'd even had a chance to think about it for himself. And what was he instructed to do with that gift?

Hurt.

Kill. Destroy. Ruin.

The only thing that Vel Anir saw in his gift was a weapon. Henk didn't want to be a weapon. Did that make him such a bad person? Was he truly in the wrong? Hell, he didn't know anymore. And now Kristen, who he loved as though she were his little sister, was staring up at him as though he were the crazy one.

It broke his heart a little.

"I'm not..." He tried to speak, frustration catching the words in his throat as he brought a hand to his temple, clenching his jaw. "I'm not special, Kristen!"

It had come out louder than he intended, and it kept going.

"I'm not a leader like Edric or Ralene! I'm not devastatingly powerful like Zael, or a borderline genius like Noel!" He was shouting. Why was he shouting? He couldn't recognize his own voice, but he knew it was his because of the pain in his chest as he spoke the words.

"And I'm not... I'm not strong enough to consign myself to my fate. I don't have the strength to accept what this life has to offer me."

His tone was lowering, the shouting stopped. Henk couldn't look her in the eye now. She'd looked up to him before, maybe. But now she knew, knew what a weakling he was.

"I'm not strong enough to be the Dreadlord that you thought I was. I'm sorry."

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

A quiet moment.

And then Kristen said in a tiny voice, "Don't you want to be?"

Her eyes, round and wide and hopeful. Pleading. Nearly begging him to say yes.

And underneath a fear. A fear that he would say no. And a fear of herself, how her heart would recoil, if he did.

Henk

 

[Henk]

That look she was giving him... She had no idea how badly she was hurting him, did she?

Of course... She was in pain too. All of them were in pain because of this damned city.

But Kristen didn't see it that way, and Henk knew she never had. She was proud. Of her heritage and of her home. In a way, that made Henk envious-- He longed to be capable of considering this place where he truly belonged.

"I wish I could be like them. Of course I do. I wish that I could... be special. You deserve that from me."

 Henk shook his head slowly.

"But that's not who I am. And if you listen to any one piece of advice I give you, listen to this: It is never worth it to try and fight who you are inside. Don't change, not for anybody."

He lowered to sit on one of the racks. She'd loathe him now. Think him a traitor. Maybe he was.

"But I will continue. I will not abandon this path, even though I dislike it. Doing so would mean turning my back on you, on all of the ones I love. So I fight. But do not ask me to change, Kristen. I just can't."

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

Her eyes closed and she twisted her head off to one side, as if averting her gaze from some grisly sight. There was something detestable about this revelation of Henk's, and it made her feel both nauseated and angry. Detestable, though an accurate enough word, wouldn't fully encompass her opinion of it; no, the word she was searching for wouldn't occur to her until she faced a similar revelation with Edric after an ill-fated mission in the desert of Amol-Kalit.

Here, specifically in Henk's case, it wasn't that he was weak. If it were so, Kristen would have begrudged him nothing, for he would be among the very people she in her heart's desire wished to protect. It wasn't that. It wasn't that he was weak.

It was that he was strong, and he was choosing to be weak.

Kristen stood. Still refusing to look at him, head turned and eyes closed.

"I hope that someday...you'll prove yourself wrong."

She swallowed, arms trembling with anxiety and other emotions of a more fiery nature, and turned on her heels. Walked toward the Armory door. There she hesitated with her hand on the door's handle for just a moment.

And then she opened the door and left.

Henk