[ Arya is angry. Ben can see it in her body language, as he speaks. She might be small and mysterious and from a world he doesn't know but he can recognize the signs. Some things transcend universes. Ben feels guilty and uneasy, then, seeing that. It's such a tough choice to make - knowing how much he ought to tell her so she doesn't feel alone, so she understands he has also been through things when he reassures her, and also, knowing what he ought not to tell to someone so young. Not because she couldn't handle it, but because she shouldn't have to. There is a difference between respecting her, and treating her like an adult when she is not one. ]
It is horrible. I don't know if I should've told you. I don't really talk about it. It only makes people really sad and angry, and I don't like remembering anyway.
[ Ben's looking down at his own hands, now, picking at a stray thread in the cuff of his hoodie. Arya's indignation on his behalf is a good thing. He ought to feel good, knowing she's angry about it. Like it proves he was right to be so bothered all these years. But on the other hand, Ben just feels queasy. His father was his father, biology aside, so if his father had been cruel to him in ways that fathers shouldn't be, that must mean something had been wrong with him, to cause all of it.
It's such a tangle, in his mind. ]
Maybe. Most days I think that, if only - if only because of the stuff he did to my brothers and sisters. Worse stuff. But some days I think he was right, at least when it came to me. That he was just doing his best, to keep everyone safe from. A thing like me.
[ Ben should stop talking. He knows he should stop. This is all much too heavy and too personal and too much. But the words keep coming. ]
But if- that was what he really wanted, why didn't he just kill me when I was still a baby? Or give me drugs to suppress my powers like he did to Vanya? He wasn't... doing the only thing he could to keep me from being the evil violent thing I was born to be. He had to - force me to kill, so that I would kill the people he wanted killed.
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It is horrible. I don't know if I should've told you. I don't really talk about it. It only makes people really sad and angry, and I don't like remembering anyway.
[ Ben's looking down at his own hands, now, picking at a stray thread in the cuff of his hoodie. Arya's indignation on his behalf is a good thing. He ought to feel good, knowing she's angry about it. Like it proves he was right to be so bothered all these years. But on the other hand, Ben just feels queasy. His father was his father, biology aside, so if his father had been cruel to him in ways that fathers shouldn't be, that must mean something had been wrong with him, to cause all of it.
It's such a tangle, in his mind. ]
Maybe. Most days I think that, if only - if only because of the stuff he did to my brothers and sisters. Worse stuff. But some days I think he was right, at least when it came to me. That he was just doing his best, to keep everyone safe from. A thing like me.
[ Ben should stop talking. He knows he should stop. This is all much too heavy and too personal and too much. But the words keep coming. ]
But if- that was what he really wanted, why didn't he just kill me when I was still a baby? Or give me drugs to suppress my powers like he did to Vanya? He wasn't... doing the only thing he could to keep me from being the evil violent thing I was born to be. He had to - force me to kill, so that I would kill the people he wanted killed.