ph_logs | what arms have lain under my head til morning? [mixed]

"Ah...hm." Tarantulas hesitates for a long moment, his fingers petting restlessly over the top of Dawn's head.

"César," he finally says hesitantly. "I don't want to make things difficult for you. So I should probably explain...Mairi isn't speaking to me right now. She's quite annoyed with me actually -- because of certain things I had to do, to make sure Dawn would be born."

There's a ring on one of Tarantulas's fingers, made of pewter and shaped like a vine with fig leaves.

He clears his throat. "Actually, quite a few people are displeased with me right now," he admits uncomfortably. Perhaps he shouldn't have come here after all...

"You made a deal." César states, not accusing. "An exchange for a life."

He puts a hand on Tarantulas's shoulder. "... What's done is done. You're both here. You're struggling. Babies are already hard enough on their own as a single parent. I can help you struggle a little less. Mairi isn't pissed enough to want a baby orphaned, even if only overnight."

César has one additional insight. "You came here because you knew I'd see the situation for what it is and can put my emotions aside to help. Becoming a druid doesn't erase my scientific rationality but compliments it. What's science but the study of the world around us?"

"...Yes." The word comes out as an anxious confession. But as César continues speaking, his words begin to sink in, and Tarantulas begins to slowly lower his guard. By the time César is done speaking, he's even managed a small, approving smile.

"I had...hopes, that you would see it that way," he says quietly. "You truly have a great scientific mind, César. I'm glad that I have the chance to know you -- and you're quite right." He sighs. "I do need a considerable amount of help. Perhaps...beginning with that healing you offered?"

César's relieved to see Tarantulas respond to reason; he had been worried the man could end up hyping himself up quickly to rushing off. And that would be incredibly, incredibly bad. Because Tarantulas would not manage getting far. At all.

He smiles softly in turn. "... Two like minds, then. But it's honestly less science and more compassion, here." César breathes in and out to steady himself. "Let me get a look at your stitches so I can direct the magic better."

"All right." Tarantulas uses his spider legs to shift Dawn a little higher against his chest, reaching down to undo the buttons of his shirt one-handed. Erik stopped him from bleeding out, but it's still an ugly wound, nonetheless. And his internal organs are still in bad shape from being shoved out of the way and squashed by Dawn's rapid growth.

"...Might I ask you an odd question," he wonders out loud, after a moment of studying César as his friend studies him.

He waits as Tarantulas moves Dawn and uncovers the wound, wishing he could offer to hold the girl without Tarantulas taking it badly. César does his best not to wince at the wound, but his brows do slowly knit together in worry. It takes him a moment to realize that a question's been asked, and then a moment more to go back over what the question was.

César answers that question with a soft smile, looking up to Tarantulas's eyes. "Odd questions are just interesting ones."

Tarantulas wouldn't be offended, but neither does it occur to him to hand Dawn to César of his own accord. She was still part of his own soul, just a few days ago -- he has a hard time putting her down for long. It should pass soon, as he gets more used to the current state of things.

"True," he says with a shy little smile of his own. "But I find that many people struggle this kind of question, and what it says about the asker." He sighs quietly. "What does compassion feel like? I've observed it in other people often enough to be sure it's more than a social construct, but I don't believe I've ever experienced it in myself."

At some point, César will want to hold the baby. It's important Dawn doesn't get too attached to just Tarantulas. But for now, in this situation? Best to let Tarantulas hold her.

César immediately has to pause for a moment to consider. "... Ah. Let me heal you while I give that a bit of thought."

And so he does, gently dumping both of his spell slots into healing Tarantulas as much as he's able.

"For me, compassion is mirroring the emotions that others are feeling or at least understanding how they must be feeling, then spurring yourself into action. Like when you arrived just now, exhausted. I didn't feel exhausted myself, but I could see you desperately needed help. And so I moved to help."

César inspects the wound, seeming satisfied with its improvement. "For some people it's natural, but for others, it needs to be learned. I was about half and half. Naturally could feel it, but I had to learn to pay attention to others' feelings to having it always occur when it should. Even though I was a compassionate child, I started feeling it much deeper when I was seventeen. That's when my baby brother was born, and I offered to help my parents with him, even if they made me prioritize my studies. Babies can't talk or take care of themselves, so you really have to pay attention to them and then act upon it."

He looks over to Dawn and smiles softly. "The first time Rex reached out to me to pick him up, I felt my heart nearly swell and burst. ... It must be harder, for your people, to develop compassion. You arrive in the world fully grown with the responsibilities of an adult immediately thrust on you. We organics learn it in childhood."

The healing is uncomfortable but over quickly, and Tarantulas is relieved to find his pain much reduced. But his real interest lies in César's explanation; he listens carefully, head tilted slightly to the side.

"So you think it's connected to the familial bond? That that's where it begins?" He presses his lips together in thought. "I'd assumed it was more the opposite. That the urge to care for one's family comes from something innate, while the urge to look after other people requires more of a conscious decision...I'm aware that some families can be quite toxic towards each other," he adds, lest César think he's operating on bad information that needs correcting. "But taking different cultural standards into account, the majority of families tend towards mutual aid and looking after each other's interests. That was true even on Cybertron -- we have no concept of parentage, but we do have siblings. Sparks will sometimes spontaneously split during early development, forming twins, and noble lineages used to maintain private hot spots, with all emerging newsparks counted as siblings."

He holds Dawn close, cuddling with her as he thinks. "When I think of the things I want to do for Dawn -- raising her, educating her, protecting her from harm -- I think of them as acts of love, but also a responsibility. She didn't choose to exist; I made that choice for her. I can't guarantee her a good life, but that doesn't mean I'm off the hook for trying to provide one."

He says quietly and looks at César directly, saying, "I think I've only really loved three or four people in my life, and as for responsibility...you know that I respect the social contract. One must contribute if one wishes to enjoy the benefits of belonging to a community. And for someone I had some degree of affection for, I can see myself willingly giving a bit more. But to go further than that, without the expectation of an exchange..." He shakes his head slightly. "I simply can't picture it. Your brother is one thing, but what drives you to treat other people that way?"

César buttons Tarantulas's shirt back up for him before going back to sit across the table. Give him space to converse. And he quietly listens to everything that Tarantulas has to say, afterwards crossing his arms and leaning back to indicate he's considering all that carefully.

"You have a good head on your shoulders about a lot of this, if that's any consolation. Especially with Dawn."

César looks up as if he can stare into the heavens through a house in broad daylight. "What drives me is the cumulative knowledge and philosophy of humanity that started existed 65,000 to 50,000 years ago. Humans are born fragile and helpless. We'd starve immediately without our parents. But raising children is also energy and time intensive."

He looks down at Tarantulas, smiling softly. "Thus, children must be cared for by everyone in the group, or else no children will ever be born. And then we must take care of those in the group, because the loss of any one individual is a loss of potential and a working set of hands. ... and much of this? It's reinforced by our emotions, which have been honed by evolution to give us the best chance of survival."

César smirks. "The power of humanity is teamwork. One individual is weak. Many are strong. And I want to give back to the continuation of history for those who are alive and for those who yet live. To keep the flow of history going."

He shrugs, then laughs a little. "It helps that it feels good to see people's lives improve, too. Feeling their happiness also drives me. The bubbling warmth feels my entire being."

Edited 2024-05-10 13:50 (UTC)

Tarantulas twitches slightly when César reaches for his stomach, watching curiously as he buttons up his shirt for him. Ah, that does make it a little easier to resettle Dawn and sit more comfortable. He listens carefully to the things César has to say, only sighing quietly at the end in what might be wistful, or perhaps even envy.

"The continuity of organics sapients," he says softly. "Do you know what an asset that is to your species? Your individual lifespans are so short, but look at how far you've come in less than a million years! The kind of stagnation, the creative sterility, that plagues Cybertronian society is simply impossible on organic worlds...it can't even find a place to take root."

He sighs again, leaning back slightly in his chair. In his arms, Dawn has stuck a corner of her blanket into her mouth and sucks on it meditatively, staring at the sunbeams on the ceiling with her wide buttery eyes.

"Could I have another glass of water?" Tarantulas finally asks.

"It's one of the reasons I don't want to live forever. I already accept I'll die some day, and I hope it to be because of old age after a full life." César finds mortality to be a strength.

He watches Dawn for a moment with a soft smile, eyes flicking up to Tarantulas as he speaks; César stands to go back to fetch him some more water. "Of course. Do you want anything to eat? Calories are important right now while you're healing."

"I think I'd like to be present for that," Tarantulas says quietly; for once the negative connotations of something he said occur to him before someone has to point it out, and he winces, explaining, "I mean that...being there at the end of someone I respected, I think...I'd be sorry to see you go, obviously, but if it was like that...I think it would be a good memory. You know, eventually."

He's made himself flustered now. When César offers him food he shakes his head quickly. "No thank you. My stomach's still unsettled."

"Just water, then." César puts another glass of water down on the table in front of Tarantulas, chuckling. "No, it's okay. I know what you mean. I see funerals as something that should be celebrations Not even all of us human-based organics can agree on how funerals should be. I'll make arrangements so you can be there."

He sits back down, his expression growing a little more serious. "... I'll be having a funeral for my parents in September, if you'd like to attend that. I think they'd be charmed by you attending to understand us more. They were scientists, too. We all worked on the same project together."

For a moment Tarantulas can only stare, stunned.

"You...really want me there? For something like that?" he finally asks. When César doesn't immediately answer in the negative, Tarantulas begins to actually stammer, flustered once again. "César, that would...I'd be very pleased -- no, that's not the right word," he interrupts himself, grimacing. "I mean, it'd be an honor. I'd be honored to attend."

It's not simply the event himself that has him so emotional. He's seen funerals before, from tens of thousands of different cultures -- but always from a distance, as a neutral observer. He's never felt any attachment to a member of the family before, nor they to him. This invitation is unprecedented, despite the extreme length of his life.

César smiles more broadly, charmed by how flustered Tarantulas is, and glad he was right about how much it would mean to him to attend. "Yes. They took great effort to help me become part of the world. If they were still alive today, they'd extend the same hand of friendship to you. Some things can only be understood if you've experienced them first hand."

what arms have lain under my head til morning? [mixed]

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