to protect and serve

[eudorapatch]

WHO: Detective Eudora Patch
WHAT: the face-to-face option for her network post, looking for clothes and ammo and other necessities, learning her environment by hitting the streets walkways
WHEN: whole month of July for most of it, though an immediate response to her network post would happen on the 15th, and a belated response can happen any time after that
WHERE: room 020, but also kind of everywhere?
WARNINGS: anything in response to her network post may contain detailed and blunt discussions of violence/death/dying - anything at all with her runs a small risk of her at least thinking about her own death. if this will upset you, please tell me so before we begin so that i can avoid it.

NOTES: I don't like brackets/action-spam. It's not natural for me to write that way, and I much prefer prose. I can read it just fine (but please don't make your bracket text super tiny) and don't mind if styles don't match. So you're welcome to tag me in action-spam, but just be prepared for my responses to come back in prose.

option A
After Patch makes her post to the network, she feels an odd moment of disconnect. What if no one responds? What if she is the only one feeling overwhelmed and out of her depth? What if she just aired her trauma, and she's the only one going through it?

Well, if she did, then she did. Can't change it, and wouldn't even if she could. Because she might not be alone. It might help someone else. Which makes it worth it.

She goes to the door of her room, unlocks it, opens it. It closes again on its own. Right. She opens it again, waits for it to try and close, and sticks her hand in the way. She's prepared to yank it back quickly, lest she lose some fingers, but the door halts its progress, presumably in response to whatever is blocking it. That'll work. She comes up with a little squat metal container that used to hold something, but now is only home to a vaguely musty smell. With that placed along the recessed metal track, it leaves the door to room 020 open about a foot, unable to lock, and accessible to anyone walking past.

option B
She doesn't have much. The clothes on her back, main weapon, ankle weapon, and a few extra clips of ammunition. Plus the junk from her pockets. Never thought she'd see the day when taking stock of her possessions would include a mental tally of 'eight mint lifesavers' but the universe seems determined to keep tossing up hurdles in her path. Well, bring it on. High school track about to pay off in a big way. Metaphorically. She checks her weapons, tightens her ponytail, and runs her fingers over the gentle ridges and valleys of her badge where it's resting under her shirt, like a talisman. Time to go learn her new neighbourhood.

option C
Also time to go shopping. If you can call it that. Some extra clothing would be a good start. Boots, jeans, and jacket she can make do. But a spare shirt, a change of underwear, and something to sleep in, that would be nice. Toothbrush, hair brush, maybe a book. Anything to keep her occupied.

option !
Wildcard! You know how this works. Come at me, bro! :3

15 July
afternoon - Ben comes to talk about how he knows Patch - room 020
also afternoon - Drake stops by for more cheery death talk - room 020
late evening - Cole waits until everyone else has come and gone - room 020

16 July
afternoon - finding out just what a tiny thing Peter is - R & D

Comments

A

[benhargreeves]

Ben had responded to her network post without pausing to think things through. Usually, he isn't impulsive like that, but this is the woman who saved Klaus, talking about dying. It must have struck some kind of nerve. So, in his hurry to respond, he'd forgotten that she doesn't know what he looks like, she doesn't know he was there at the time, maybe she doesn't know anything about him apart from his name.

And facing the prospect of trying to explain all that through a tiny communication device... well, it's just all wrong. Maybe it wouldn't feel that way if he grew up in a world with different technology, who knows? In any case, he sends a quick follow-up video to her, saying he would be there soon to explain. So he makes his way to the room number she'd mentioned in the video, and on the walk there, composes himself, thinking over what he wants to say.

Ben raps his knuckles against the open door even as he is slouching in, hood up, looking wary and solemn.

"Hey, Detective Patch? Sorry for the weird reply, before."

He pauses, visibly considering before offering his hand to shake and saying, by way of explanation, "Ben Hargreeves."

Ben looks around, finds the nearest suitable place to sit or lean, and does so. He wants it clear that this is a conversation that is going to take a little while, and have some weight to it. Though she could probably piece that together from the context. Folding his arms across his chest, Ben sighs.

"When I sent that video, I'd forgotten that last time we were in a room together, you couldn't see me or hear me because I was a ghost. I was at the motel."

He knows what it is like, to die. Knows she won't need him to explain which motel, and when. She'll know.

[eudorapatch]

She's about to tell him that he doesn't have to apologize for the reply, but then he introduces himself, and that sure is a thing. Ben is the alternate name for Number Six, and Number Six is dead. She knows this. Diego might have spared her the details, but she knows the broad strokes. Very very dead, and long before she found Klaus, long before Patch and Diego ever crossed paths, long before she even graduated from high school, let alone the Academy. She nods her head, slowly, and shakes his hand, mumbling something about it being nice to meet him while she tries to wrap her mind around it all. He could be here from the moment of his death, like her, and she's just coming to grips with that thought when he keeps going.

That's just. Yeah. That's a thing. Patch opens her mouth to ask him how, but then closes it. No. She opens her mouth again to ask him why, but then closes it. Finally, she presses her lips together, lets her cheeks puff out with a held breath of air, and then lets it out in a noisy rush. Right.

She goes to the door, very deliberately moves the metal container so that it can close and lock, sets it carefully on the desk. Then she looks at Ben, opens her mouth, closes it. She needs to stop doing that. It's incredibly unprofessional, and probably very rude. Ben is on the couch, and while there is room for her to sit next to him, she doesn't want to. It's not him. It's her way of processing. Usually, she sits close to people to establish a connection, to make a bridge of physical proximity. At this moment, she wants a little bit of distance. So she moves a little stiffly to the desk and its lone chair, grabbing it and dragging it across the floor. About half way there, it occurs to her that she should have just picked it up. Less noise. Oh well. She sits down, her chair still a few feet from Ben. This time, when she opens her mouth, a few stuttering sounds of an aborted attempt to say something manage to get out, then she clears her throat, licks her lips. She doesn't even know where to start.

Maybe he will. "Start at the beginning?"

[benhargreeves]

Ben doesn't seem surprised or at all bothered by Patch's long confused silence. He waits, arms folded, face quiet and pensive. There is a stillness to him that is patient, and - though Patch doesn't know it yet - kind. He watches her close the door, struggle to find what to say, drag a chair over and sit. She's handling it a lot better than he'd expected. A lot better than most people probably would. Ben likes her already.

When she tells him to start at the beginning, he takes a moment to really consider where the beginning would be. What is the relevant information that she needs? What can he say that it might be a comfort or a help for her to hear?

"We were all in the Academy together - Klaus, Diego, me, the rest of our siblings. But things..." A pause here, as for a moment the tables are flipped and Ben is the one struggling to get words out, "...happened, and I died when I was sixteen. Klaus - he's the one you saved - can see ghosts. So I've been with him since then. Trying to keep him safe and out of trouble. When he got kidnapped, I came with. I knew there was nothing I could really do to help him, I just... didn't want him to be alone. So I was there when you showed up."

And, by implication, he had been there just a few moments later when she had been ambushed and shot. He doesn't say that out loud, though. He has some small amount of tact. Rubbing at his cheek, he continues, "I'm sorry to ambush you with all of this. When I saw your video... when I saw it, I knew I had to thank you, and I also realized that if- if somebody had been there, when I died, and seen it happen, and they didn't tell me, I would feel-"

There's a long pause, ending in a shrug, and a quiet conclusion: "-sort of, like, violated, I guess."

[eudorapatch]

"I remember that. Being in high school and hearing about what happened to you on the news. No details, but there was a lot of speculation." It's hardly the same as seeing bits of her life while living in the realm of ghosts (and how fucking insane is it that that's real?) but it's still some tiny glimpse she already has of his life, and its ending. So she shares it.

Then she stops, because she's not sure where else to go. Lot of thoughts. Most of them aren't all that great. Most of them are very painful.

She leans forward, which does not exactly put her in his personal space, but it's not leaning away from him. So it's something. Her elbows brace on her knees, and the fingers of her hands lace together, and she thinks about it. Ben doesn't seem to mind the silence. "Thank you for telling me. I know it wasn't exactly your choice to be there when I died, but you didn't have to say anything. You could have kept quiet and avoided an awkward conversation, and I wouldn't have known." Not that she's sure it's really a help, yet. She's not sure what she feels, full stop.

Thinking about her own death, that's still rough. Thinking about the broader strokes of what he's said, that's much easier. "So ghosts... Does Klaus-- does he make them? Or are they just... there... all the time?"

[benhargreeves]

Ben rubs the back of his neck, nods once to acknowledge he has heard her and understands what she is doing. He had given his disclosure, and now she's giving hers. It probably makes him a bad person or something, but he's glad that, apparently, Diego hadn't told her any more than what was on the news. Diego never talking about it probably wasn't very healthy and Ben knows his death had fucked up his siblings - some more than others - but the shred of privacy is a relief nonetheless.

She's a lot more gracious about it than he probably would have been, if the tables were turned. Ben can see how she would have been a good detective. Good at communicating. Calm even in the face of a crisis. What a shame. What a waste, that she had died the way she did.

"I liked what you said in that video. About us all helping each other. I wanted you to know you aren't alone. And that if - you wanted to talk about dying, with somebody who's done it too, and who was there..." He gives a small gesture towards himself, offering himself up. She had gone on the network and told everyone she was willing to listen. She deserves to have the same offer made to her, emphatically. "And I think... it's probably gonna hard for Diego or Klaus to talk about it with you without it hurting them a lot. So I want you to know, you can talk to me, and not worry about hurting me."

Because as much as he's already coming to like her, Patch is a stranger to him. Not a former lover, like she is for Diego, and not the person who saved him from torture and almost certain death and got killed in the process, like she is for Klaus. Ben fully believes he can hear anything she has to say without breaking down. He is offering his ability to be a little detached as a resource, should she want it.

The question she asks first is not what he expected - much more functional than personal. He wants very much to answer it to her satisfaction, but...

"I, uh don't- really know."

He hadn't been prepared for things to get so theoretical and abstract so fast. But he does his best to generalize his personal experience and explain:

"I could be in places without Klaus. The house, mostly. Mostly at night. But I wasn't... around, all the time. And being near him was always... different. I can't describe it. I don't know if it's because of his powers, though, or because he's my family."

All this talking about the mechanics of being a ghost is making Ben a little light-headed; he folds his arms over his chest again, fingers tracing out the textures and folds of his jacket, the hoodie underneath. Pressing in, reminding him he's corporeal, now.

"I'm sorry. Just because I spent half my existence as a ghost doesn't mean I'm an expert on how they work. Nobody hands out a manual. And I'm not sure I really count as a usual case."

[eudorapatch]

Diego has discussed his feelings (something that would probably shock his siblings to hear) but not the details. The details were less important to Patch at the time, anyway. The details of what happened could only serve to slake her own curiosity, they wouldn't do Diego any good. The pain of the loss, the grief, and helping him to process it, even all those years later - that had been far more important to her. It had also been almost more than Diego could handle. He didn't do so well with loss and grief.

Diego isn't here, though. Ben is. And Patch watches him start to fidget and knows oh so well the telltale signs of someone shutting down. "It's all right. You don't have to talk about it. I probably shouldn't have asked. It's just-- it's a lot. Ghosts. That's... everything I knew about death and some things I knew about life, things I knew to be true, and it turns out that they're not. The people I've lost-- It just. It opens up a lot of uncomfortable avenues of thought. I don't know what I'm certain of any more. Maybe nothing." She takes a deep breath and lets it out in a sigh. "None of which is your fault. You're just being honest. I'm grateful for that." Maybe there's nothing she can count on to be knowable. Maybe everything is just... maybe it's all bull shit.

"Thank you for the offer. I appreciate that you have no personal investment, but also know what happened, but even still, it's not an easy thing to offer. The thing is... I don't want to be the reason you have to keep something from your brothers. You know Diego, probably better than I do. It doesn't matter if he won't talk to me himself, if he knows that we've talked, he'll want to know what I said to you. He'll want the details. He'll be incapable of accepting that he's out of the loop, even if it's a loop he doesn't actually want to be in." She shakes her head. "I can't do that to you. To either of you."

[benhargreeves]

"Oh, I should've- it's not like everybody becomes a ghost when they die. I probably should have led with that."

This conversation is not going in the way he expected at all, and Ben hadn't really braced himself for anything this metaphysical. Still, he can see that Patch is grappling with a lot of Big Questions and he rushes to clarify a few things, lest she get the wrong idea.

"Detective Patch, I get it if you don't want to... walk down those avenues, but honestly, I don't feel like me being around invalidates any way of thinking about life and death or- if you were maybe religious, or stuff like that. Other than... if you were thinking death was the absolute end, do not pass go, no such thing as the afterlife. In which case, yeah, that one's off the table. But everything else, it's just - a couple new questions, maybe some different questions. Nothing all that drastic."

Ben really does believe that's true. His face is earnest and a little concerned, now, and he laces his hands together in his lap. He thinks about saying something about how he and his siblings were already breaking all the previous rules about life and death, what with the spontaneous fatherless births and all, but he changes his mind. That would probably only be stirring things up and making them worse. Best to leave it be unless she asks anything else.

Her reasons for not letting herself get the benefit of talking about stuff are... to be honest, not great, to Ben's mind. A little furrow forms between his dark brows.

"Well. The way I see it, you've got some options. You can decide not talk to me, because you realized you don't want to, and that's cool. You can decide to talk to me, and that it's none of Diego's business, and that's fine, too. I appreciate what you're saying, but I'm comfortable with keeping things from Diego. You won't be driving a wedge, or anything. Or, option three is, you can decide to talk to me, and then tell me what is and isn't okay to pass along to Diego, if that would be easier for you."

Ben's head tilts to the side a little. All these years of trying to coach Klaus into better life choices has left him with an inclination towards giving advice, whether or not someone has asked for it. It's also left him primed to see avoidance, and he's wondering if Patch is a self-abnegating saint, or if she is maybe using Diego's fragility as an excuse to avoid confronting her death. Either option is a little concerning.

"Mostly, I kinda hope you'll make that call based on your needs, and not only on Digeo's hypothetical feelings."

And then, because he doesn't want Patch feeling pressured into giving an answer right away (hopefully she'll think it over and consider herself a little bit more in the process), he goes on immediately to ask:

"I'm guessing nobody's... talked to you about who it was that killed you, and what they were doing, and the whole story. If... you'd like some context, I could tell you?"

[eudorapatch]

She lets out a very shaky breath when he tells her that not everyone becomes a ghost. So the world isn't just completely packed with unseen spirits, the end of their lives turned into some sort of endless wandering torment. That's, well, it's not the full comfort she had last week, but it's certainly something. She can deal with that. She doesn't really have a choice, after all. "I never thought it was the end," she tells him, not that she expects he was looking for clarification. Still, saying it out loud might be a help to her. "The human mind is too miraculous to be nothing more than a lump of fat and water and electricity. We're something more." She says it with conviction, but not force. She's certain. Whatever anyone else believes, whatever brings them comfort, she's certain again for herself.

"My death..." Still such a trippy thing to say out loud. "Well, I know there had to be at least two of them, and whoever was behind me was quiet." She's speaking slowly, because she's deciding. Does she want to know? Will it bring her closure? Will it just twist her up more inside? Thing it, she has no way of knowing until he tells her, and once he does, it can't be taken back.

So the real question is: does she want her blissful ignorance? The answer to that question has never been yes. Not once, in her entire life. Even when knowledge is pain, she's always wanted to know. Which means she does now, too. "What happened? How did I die? I mean--" She sighs. "I know how." She taps two fingers over her sternum. Obviously she knows what physically killed her. "Why did I die?" That's what she doesn't know.

[benhargreeves]

Ben sees that this new information steadies her a little, and is glad for that. He hasn't had to consider it all that much, the way him being a ghost might cause some existential crises. He has mostly thought of it on a personal level, because he'd been thinking about family. But as he starts to talk to people outside that small circle, well. Perhaps he should tread more lightly, to prevent a repeat of this in the future. Hopefully, Patch will only continue to digest the information, reconcile it with her beliefs, accept it and find a new kind of certainty and comfort.

He doesn't rush her as she makes her decision, waiting until she has found the right question to ask, and asks it, meets his eyes. The answer for why she died is, of course, because life is unfair, and violent, and things just happen randomly and they are awful and good people, innocent people, have the rest of their lives snatched away without warning all the time. But that's not the sort of why she means, and he knows it.

"It's a long story, so I'm going to try to condense it. Just bear with me."

After her reaction to just the information that ghosts are a thing, Ben is going to avoid the whole 'by the way the apocalypse happens a few days after you die' bombshell. Not that he's going to lie, but there is a way to tell all this that doesn't get into that. That would be a huge distraction, and likely an upsetting one. He's going to stick to Eudora's place in all this.

"You know that Five went missing, when we were kids?" A quick glance tells him she does, so he goes on, "I'm not gonna get into most of it, but he ended up working for this organization, that uses time travel to ensure that history goes a certain way - the way they want it. And they do whatever it takes to make that happen. The people who took Klaus, who killed you... they work for that same group. See, they hired Five, but he wasn't into their bullshit, and he just used them to find a way home. They were pissed, so they hired a bunch of thugs to come get him."

Ben had had some of these gaps filled in as Klaus was being tortured, other in the subsequent days overhearing conversations between his brothers. It is good, to be able to provide some clarity, even if it doesn't really make the whole situation any less messy and unfair and horrific.

"Five fought those guys off at this old donut shop we used to go to as kids, so the organization sent some of their own skilled assassins the next time. Hazel, and Cha Cha. I don't know their deal. I just know they- they showed up to our house and when they saw Five wasn't there, they kidnapped Klaus. They were trying to get him to tell them where Five was. Torturing him and stuff. And... they wanted him as bait. I guess they left cryptic messages around or something, hoping Five would find them and come rushing to that motel. But he didn't show up."

The barest hint of bitterness creeps into his voice then, but he doesn't tell Patch that Five had been drunk in a library, totally checked out of his family's safety. That little shard of anger is Ben's own business, and not completely relevant to her death.

"I don't know how you found us, but it was a trap. The trap was meant for Five, but- but you ended up in it. So it was always going to be an ambush. They were ready to kill whoever turned up to help Klaus, without hesitation."

[eudorapatch]

That fingerprint from the 1938 cold case. The organization hit men came after that whole mess went down, according to Ben. Those guys in the doughnut shop, they'd all had records, without gaps. The print hadn't belonged to any of them, and the chances that only one had gotten away? Slim. Five's fingerprint. Because he's a time traveling historian? That doesn't sound right. Time traveling killer, though? That would fit. She doesn't say this. She probably would have gotten to it, would have asked, but the rest of Ben's story fast eclipses her own need to tie up loose ends.

Klaus was bait. Bait for Five. She walked into a trap, with Klaus as live bait. Which means...

"He would have been fine."

She drops her head. She can't look at Ben.

"If I'd done what I was supposed to do, gotten the warrant, called in for backup. I went charging in because I thought he didn't have time, but... he was bait. He would have been fine. Later that night, later that week. You don't kill your leverage. You don't kill the hostage. I saved him some pain. I didn't save his life." She'd wasted her life, thrown it away. Not saving someone, that wouldn't have been a waste. Giving her life for someone who would have been just fine if she'd waited, though? Yeah. This is what she gets for breaking her own rules, for thinking that Diego's vigilante make believe was a good idea.

She takes a shaking breath, but she can't look at him. If she actually makes eye contact, she's afraid she'll cry.

"I think you should probably go. I'm sorry. Don't-- tell your brother. Either of them. Don't tell them I died for nothing." Diego must know. Maybe that's why he was looking at her that way, when he first saw her. Because he knew. But maybe Klaus doesn't. "He shouldn't have to carry that."

[benhargreeves]

"No, he wouldn't have."

There is a time and a place for considering the variety of ways that things could have gone down, but Ben can tell this isn't one of them. Patch isn't looking at him, and she sounds so distraught. And given what she's thinking, he doesn't blame her for that. So he gives answers that are more certain-sounding than is perhaps statistically entirely true. But he believes what he's saying.

"Five wasn't coming." That anger is now both of their business, and Ben lets it show, "He was off somewhere getting drunk. He didn't even know Klaus was missing. Neither did Luther or Diego. They thought Five was the missing one. And- and you didn't hear the way Hazel and Cha-Cha were talking, okay. Klaus was pissing them off. They had a deadline they were trying to meet, they were already over schedule or whatever. Another hour, maybe less, they would've just shot him in the head and gone back to the drawing board."

Ben reaches out and holds Patch's upper arm - hard enough to be bracing but not painful. She might not be looking at him, but his tone of voice is firm and more passionate than it has been this whole time. He has to be able to get through to her. Somehow.

"And backup wouldn't have been better. Probably if a bunch of cop cars had shown up, if he'd made it that long, they would've killed Klaus then and run. Easier than trying to get away with him alive."

Ben's voice is a little throaty with emotion now, but he pushes on through.

"I died for nothing. Okay? So I know... how you must be feeling. But it wasn't like that. You saved someone, from torture, and captivity. It shouldn't have happened. You shouldn't have had that happen to you. But that's so not nothing."

[eudorapatch]

Patch takes a deep breath, and it trembles on the end. When she looks up at Ben, her eyes are shiny, but the tears aren't falling. Not yet.

She just nods. "Okay."

She doesn't believe him, but she can see that it's important to him. She can hear it in his voice and feel it in the grip of his fingers on her arm. He has a need to make her understand, and she doesn't, but they don't both have to deal with that. Whoever said misery loves company must have been an asshole, as far as Patch is concerned. When she's in pain, the last thing she's ever wanted to do is spread it around, hurt someone else just so she doesn't have to hurt alone. "You would know better than me. You saw everything I didn't."

She moves her hand on top of his, not to push him off, but to support his grip. It's fine. It's all fine. Even if she can't believe it, maybe he can.

[benhargreeves]

Patch still seems pretty upset, but then, dying is upsetting. Whether or not she actually trusts his judgment on this ... well it doesn't change the situation from being crappy. She had died, and that's a pain that is much more raw for her than it is for Ben. He's had time, to process it. Come to terms. Well, a little. But she hasn't. He isn't going to find any magic words to make that better.

An afterthought occurs to him and he adds, voice a little less grave now, "And I'm not gonna tell either of my brothers about anything we talk about, okay? I mean not unless you specifically want me to. That's just not how I roll. Even when I was a kid, I was the one the rest of them would confide in, with shit they couldn't talk to the others about, 'cause I don't gossip. Ever."

She ought to know that about him, now, before anything else. That discretion is something Ben values highly. He sighs, shoulders slumping slightly. He doesn't know if he's helped at all. He'd felt so empowered, after her message on the network. But being there for one another... maybe it's easier in theory than practice.

"Look I... can go if you want, but - are you sure you wanna be alone?"

He will go, if that's what she wants. Goodness knows, he is aware that sometimes it is best to be alone. But he wants to be sure she isn't just isolating herself for the wrong reasons.

"We don't have to keep talking. We could just - go for a walk. Or whatever."

[eudorapatch]

If she stays here, she might not be alone all that much longer. She told people where to find her, and now she's a wreck, and she won't be any good to anyone in the shape she's in now.

Is he thinking the same thing? Is he imagining what she'll go through with the next person to come through that door if she's still in such rough shape? "Maybe that's... a good idea. Make myself move." Physically, emotionally, whatever works. She takes a deep breath and stands up with something approaching determination. A walk. That's it. It's with the same determination that she moves to put on her jacket.