01-02-2020, 02:50 AM
A sudden guilt coursed through him, as he analyzed quietly the facial expressions of the young lad, realizing his gathering of thoughts had an impact on him. Small though it may be, it was still an impact, and he could feel his general apathy towards people and their actions wavering. How could one be apathetic to this, to this boy's wide eyes looking at him with fear and excitement combined into one ghoulish ball of anxiety? How could anyone look at Roy and say, with any genuine feeling, that he wasn't worth worrying about? Sure, Abathur wasn't going to change his whole life, but he still felt a little dagger of empathy twist its way into his heart. It was good to feel, yes, but sympathy was a hard thing for anyone to deal with, especially discussing sympathy towards trauma.
Perhaps Abathur saw something of himself in the young man - a scared, curious little thing, hardened by the world into something else. With Abathur, however, he came out of those experiences somewhat stronger - and with Roy, Abathur could tell that the experiences broke him down. He wasn't one to theorize, but he couldn't help his mind's racing as he wondered every sort of question to ask the child eventually. The biggest was "who did this," and after that, simply "why." It took him a moment to realize that he was doing it again, the whole drifting off in thought thing, and he did some equivalent of shaking his head (which looked strange considering his head was directly connected to half his body), letting out a quick "apologies."
"Self has been lost in thought. Did not mean to take time responding - will do better." There was a certain steely determination that could be felt in those last three words, as if he had signed a blood oath, not given the Abathur-equivalent of a sheepish promise to improve. "No," he would respond to his librarian peer first with, "have never considered fungi with much reverence, interest. Only wanted to read, and happened to select this book." Not a lie, necessarily, though he wisely left out all the details as to why he was selecting it in the first place, assuming that explaining that the boy's looking at him had put him on edge wouldn't help take Roy off of that same edge. "But," he would continue, a pedipalp moving to rest on the page he was on as he shifted his weight to get comfortable, "do find them fascinating. Find everything fascinating. Not reading to research specific topics - read to learn. Learning, knowledge, both are only true valuable things."
Perhaps Abathur saw something of himself in the young man - a scared, curious little thing, hardened by the world into something else. With Abathur, however, he came out of those experiences somewhat stronger - and with Roy, Abathur could tell that the experiences broke him down. He wasn't one to theorize, but he couldn't help his mind's racing as he wondered every sort of question to ask the child eventually. The biggest was "who did this," and after that, simply "why." It took him a moment to realize that he was doing it again, the whole drifting off in thought thing, and he did some equivalent of shaking his head (which looked strange considering his head was directly connected to half his body), letting out a quick "apologies."
"Self has been lost in thought. Did not mean to take time responding - will do better." There was a certain steely determination that could be felt in those last three words, as if he had signed a blood oath, not given the Abathur-equivalent of a sheepish promise to improve. "No," he would respond to his librarian peer first with, "have never considered fungi with much reverence, interest. Only wanted to read, and happened to select this book." Not a lie, necessarily, though he wisely left out all the details as to why he was selecting it in the first place, assuming that explaining that the boy's looking at him had put him on edge wouldn't help take Roy off of that same edge. "But," he would continue, a pedipalp moving to rest on the page he was on as he shifted his weight to get comfortable, "do find them fascinating. Find everything fascinating. Not reading to research specific topics - read to learn. Learning, knowledge, both are only true valuable things."
tags - "speech"