fandomhighdorms | Beka and Inara on the Maru

Inara pauses outside the ship and reaches one hand out to the hull.

"Beka?"

This was such a bad idea.

She won't panic. It's just a conversation. She doesn't have to tell Inara anything she doesn't want to tell her.

Before she can talk herself out of it, Beka opens the airlock to let Inara in. "Hi." She smiles but her face feels stiff.

Inara notes Beka's nervousness and puts on a tentative smile. Her objective is not to put the young woman out, but to soothe her, let her get out whatever is bothering her: find some measure of peace.

"Is now still a good time?"

Beka runs a hand through her bangs. "Yes. Well, no. But yes. There's not really a good time for stuff like this, is there?" She laughs wryly. "Please. Come in. I'll settle down in a minute."

Inara takes the offer at face value and walks in where Beka has gestured.

If she's honest with herself, she's a little nervous, too. This is her first role out of the Academy and away from Sihnon, and counselling high school students was not something she expected.

"Did you skip any classes to meet with me today?"

Beka shakes her head. "No. I went to class. I'm generally a good student."

It helps to see that Inara isn't quite as comfortable as she was the last time they talked. She's not glad that Inara feels awkward, but it's nice not to be the only one.

"Sit? Can I get you some coffee?" Hostessing. Feh. But she did invite Inara to the Maru so she probably has an obligation.

Inara realises that this is why Companions generally entertain in their own spaces: the obligations fall upon them and not on their client.

"That won't be necessary," she says, seating herself. "Unless you want anything yourself."

She wonders if she should ask the question or let the girl get to the matter disturbing her at her own pace.

"I'd like a cup actually. I know it's contrary, but coffee relaxes me. Will you have one?"

Beka's feeling better now. Even the hostessing which is so not her thing has a calming effect. "I guess you wonder why I wanted to talk to you?"

"No coffee, hot water will be fine, thank you."

Inara watches as Beka prepares the coffee. "It's in our natures to be curious, Beka - may I call you 'Beka'? But you can speak at your own pace, don't feel that you need to rush into it."

She pauses. "Is this related to the last conversation we had? Or is this something new?"

Beka brings the water to the table, then sits, holding her mug in two hands. The steam bathes her face. Hot and soothing.

"Beka, yes. Please. Anything else just makes me nervous." The coffee, when she sips it, is strong and black.

"There's an expression I've heard in another language, it means maybe yes, maybe no. Everything is related. How is a bit more complicated." Now that she's talking, it's easier. "How much do you know about what happened with me and Cameron?"

Inara sips her water and considers what she remembers.

"You were interested in him and you thought he was interested back. I heard other rumours from around the place, but nothing concrete."

Beka nods. "It went further than that. Let's say we got to the boyfriend-girlfriend stage, but some things happened and it exploded messily. There was a prank that went wrong, I was involved mostly to protect him, but he didn't believe it, and... well, it went badly.

It's over now. We're speaking, even friends again. I tease him sometimes, because girls go a little crazy over him. One girl just punched another one for kissing him." She grins. "Kinda made me feel a bit better. About falling so hard for him."

Inara grins back. "I've seen some of the young men from the school when they come out to the town. They are attractive young men.

"So this isn't about him?"

Beka sips at her coffee again, tries to organize her thoughts. "No. It's not about Cameron. It's not even really about men or women or sex, exactly...

Though, that's gotten strange too.

Maybe it sort of is.

I don't know really."

She sighs. "All right. Quick fill, in case it matters. After Cam and I exploded, I did a very typically me thing. I picked a fight with a very dangerous guy and got the hell beat out of me. I also almost had sex with him while we were doing that. Neither of these things bother me.

"I know why I did them. I don't do well with emotional pain. Physical pain, violence, sex...I understand these and can heal from them.

"After that, I went away for awhile. Sort of. My universe's time runs faster than this one. So I was away about ... three weeks and got some distance." She doesn't meet Inara's gaze now, because she's not sure she wants to know what Inara thinks about that. But she pauses to see if she does have something to say. Since that's why she's here, according to Parker, is to get unfrelled up.

Inara takes all this in. "I'm guessing that the distance didn't entirely help since you're here wanting counselling."

Beka shakes her head. "No. The distance helped fine. I've met another guy, Jack, who is really terrific. We're taking things at an appropriate speed and all is good there. I also met this incredibly sexy very dangerous bad boy with whom I'm having a marvellous time just...you know. And Jack is fine with that. I've got a stable relationship with two other close friends that sometimes includes sex. Really, my love life is, well, it's complicated, I suppose, but it's not a problem."

Aftera long sip of coffee, she looks up again. "The real problem, as Parker puts it, is that I'm broken. I've got all these things that I know about my future that are very bad. And all these things about my world and my history that are not as bad but not good. I need to sort out all the stuff that I've already done and that I'm supposed to do and figure out how to stop feeling so...broken's the best word."

Inara considers this. She's willing to dismiss the sexual or romantic aspects of Beka's relationships, although she knows that sex - like everything else in life - is integral to the being of an individual.

"We're all broken, you know," she says at last. "The 'verse - whatever variation we come from - takes us apart and puts us back together. And even if we hide the cracks, there are weaknesses there that may give under pressure."

She looks at the girl, considering her age. "Is it that you don't know where you are in time and what you've already done and are yet to do? From the sound of it, your 'verse is flexible in time comparative to this one."

Beka tilts her head and looks at Inara. "No. Not exactly. I know that this me is 17 and a half years old. I know that this me hasn't done any of the bad things yet. But... the bad things that I'm going to do, they're already present in my world. Because someone else takes my DNA back in time. This is what Future-Beka told me. I keep trying to figure out why she told me, and whether I'm going to remember when it's time."

Inara considers this.

"In my 'verse, there's a school of thought: that everything happens for a reason. That what we forget is forgotten for a reason; that what we remember is remembered for a reason; and that all things are in the places they should be at the time they need to be."

She smiles and shrugs. "It's a little existential perhaps, and that school of thought doesn't argue that the ultimate movement of the universe is towards good or evil, but there's some comfort in the idea that there is purpose behind what seems like madness or randomicity."

Beka nods, but it's a small comfort. "It's hard to imagine what reason there could be in my being the matriarch of a race that already destroyed the Commonwealth and terrorizes 'mundane' humanity."

A slow sip of coffee, without meeting Inara's eyes, and then she begins again. "The problem is, I know now that this will happen and from my universe I know that it does happen. I feel like it's up to me to stop all the bad from happening, and at the same time I already know I didn't succeed."

"How does that feel? The conflict between wanting to stop these events from taking place and the belief that you cannot succeed even if you tried?"

"Probably something like being a vampire with a human soul." The words are bitter but her tone is resigned.

"Every time I start to forget and relax, or let myself believe that I'm not responsible for someone tricking me and stealing my DNA, I do something stupid or hurtful or just plain wrong, and it comes roaring back. Like it is my fault after all, for not being smart enough to see it or good enough to stop it."

Inara files away the comment about the vampire with a human soul for future reference. There's a lot she still hasn't quite worked out about the school and its surrounds.

"Nobody's smart or good enough to stop everything," Inara says quietly. "But sometimes we can tilt the tides by being in the right place at the right time. And sometimes we just have to try.

"It sounds like you had no active involvement in the situation you describe. Is that true?"

Beka sips her coffee. After a short while, she looks up and meets Inara's gaze. "I don't know. Future-Beka didn't show me much. Flashes. I know my DNA goes back in time. I don't know when, or even how. The worst part is, I don't know if I should stop it if I could." At this last, worst, revelation, the tears she's been fighting for days film her eyes, but she blinks them away.

Inara pulls out a handkerchief and lays it on the table.

"Do you want to stop it?"

Beka stares at the handkerchief, focusing hard. Crying won't help. "Yes. But then again, I don't know. The Nietzscheans destroyed the Commonwealth. They've made humans into slaves and taken the 'best' women for breeding stock.

"But the Nietzscheans are the only thing standing between humans and the Magog. Without them, we might be extinct. But we might not, because there might be a Commonwealth still.

"I don't know. It's confusing. I just know I feel responsible." She looks up at Inara. "That probably sounds like a stupid thing to be upset about."

"Responsibility is never a stupid thing to be upset about," Inara says. "It might not be helpful to worry over it too much, but it's never stupid."

She considers what Beka has said and tries a new tack.

"If you do nothing to stop this thing happening, how will you feel? How will you feel if you try to stop this happening and fail in trying?"

"I don't feel there's anything much I can do." Beka scrubs a hand through her bangs. "Inara, I hate feeling powerless. It makes me really angry. And when I lose my temper, I do stupid, self-destructive things, or just shove my foot in my mouth.

"I guess it's not so much that I worry about this all the time. It's just there in the background, making me feel like a ticking bomb. Then other things happen... like the weapons ban. They took away my weapons, and now I have to rely on other people to protect me.

"That makes me mad ~~and a whole lot scared~~ so I run my mouth and almost get detention. Start trying to create whole movements. Whatever. I start doing without thinking, and then everything gets so. much. worse." Now she's crying, and she can't stop, and she hates it, because it's so stupid, all of it, but she hates when people are mad at her and she hates that she might lose people she cared about, and she hates that she can't protect herself and she probably should be telling these things to Inara but she can't.

Inara lays a hand lightly on the handkerchief, a slight movement to give the girl the option of taking up the linen or ignoring it.

"Let's see if I can state what we've been saying. You have this knowledge of the future, but you don't know how much of it you can change. You dislike the feeling of not being able to stop it because it makes you feel as though you're not in control of your life. And the things that are happening up at the school aren't helping your state of mind."

She senses that Beka isn't one to take physical contact lightly, so she refrains from offering it, but she isn't unmoved by the girl's distress. It's just not a situation that Beka is going to be able to change any time soon.

Beka notices the handkerchief, but for now, she's ignoring it along with her tears. It'll still be there if she can't stop.

"Yeah. Well. I feel like maybe I shouldn't change it. But I want to. And that's hard." She covers her face with her hand, but keeps talking. "This school, it makes me crazy. Always under someone's thumb. Stupid radio watching my every move. Girls in a drama about sex all the time, like you can't just have sex because it's fun. I'm thinking of moving out of the dorms."

She looks up and catches Inara's gaze. "Do you think that's a bad idea?"

"If you want to change something - if you think it is worth even the effort of trying - then I would tell you to try it. You are who you decide to be, and while your future may be certain from the point of view of the older Beka who came back to tell you what happens, that is her history - not yours.

"Philosophers and physicists say that the universe is remade at every moment with the choices of a billion souls and the random movement of a billion billion atoms. And while the older Beka's past may be definite, there is no reason that your future need be."

Aware that the conversation has taken a distinctly metaphysical turn, Inara smiles. "And the school sounds like a typical school. The immersion in school life might help you to think of more...mundane things than fate and the future."

Beka nods, considering what Inara's said. She's feeling calmer. Less tearful. So when she brushes her bangs out of her eyes, she manages a tepid smile. "Well... I'm immersed. I'm running for Student Council. Getting straight As. And Shep even nominated me for Homecoming Queen, as a joke, and I'm totally not running..." She bites her lip.

"Actually... could we talk about a sex sort of thing? I have sort of a problem that's not really a problem and I think I know what I want to do, but I'd like to see how it sounds to someone else."

Inara laughs. "We can talk about a sex sort of thing."

"Don't laugh!" Beka grins. "I'm the Sex Ed TA. And I had to explain," she coughs, "to a very innocent Cally the other night why it might be a good thing that Angelus doesn't have to breathe...during oral sex." (OOC: This totally did happen.)

"It's just, I find talking about sex with this one particular person a bit challenging. He's older than I am. A very good man. The sex is good. The problem is... I'm not good. At least not the way he is. He's all principles and soldiering and... we get along great in some ways... but..."

(OOC: She's talking about Jack O'Neill, and it might be good if we screen the thread from here, since she hasn't talked to Jack about this yet and I'm just talking to Jack-mun now. You OK with that?)

(OOC: It's 4:55 and I haven't slept. Must sleep for a few hours at least. I'm glad I caught you for a few. *hugs*)

Beka and Inara on the Maru - [privacy locked]

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OOC

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