#the pipeline of theron being scared of him then being scared of being him was slow.

[eorzeashan]

I should just buckle down and finish instead of letting my fic do psychic damage to me when i'm not writing it but I still think about the juxtaposition of Eight next to Theron. I've been trying to parse why their relationship is so tense from Theron's pov even though Eight feels no threat or animosity towards him whatsoever and besides the guilt, it's because he's looking at what he's afraid of being: a spy that became so much of the role's definition that he no longer has any place among other people. One who is used to hurting and hurting others. An agent who only exists in the liminal spaces of blacked-out documents and in the hurried whispers of shadowy figures that do not stay.

Theron is a good spy. He devotes himself wholly to the job. But he hurts and hesitates when forced to do an aspect of it that goes against his conscience; an odd thing to have as an agent, when betrayal is the name of the game.

He remains riddled with guilt for one mission that ultimately had no friendly casualties, while Eight stands before him, an agent known for killing friend and foe, for his lack of commitment to sides, for his self-made solitude built out of the skeletons of other people. Eight is so desensitized to the game that he can thrive nowhere else. Eight has been in it so long he does not blink at these actions, nor at Theron's. He wonders if he's really here for him or just to watch him fall, like a carrion feeder waiting for the body to cool.

Then he beats himself up for thinking that way towards someone who has taken shrapnel for him without hesitation before, and the cycle of having no answers to a cipher of a living being continues.

But in the back of his mind, he sees the same nightmare he so often dreams about on the most sleepless of eves; Eight is extending a hand to him, halfway through a door with no light. "Come on," He says, darkness lapping at his outline like disturbed waters, "I'll lead you to a place where no one can see your mistakes ever again."

#swtor #oc: orradiz #the pipeline of theron being scared of him then being scared of being him was slow. #it's a ridiculous notion from an outside pov #but i feel like alone with his anxiety during the traitor arc feeling how he lives for the first time #rejected by the people you serve and alone in your own game #he wonders if this is the first of many good intentions that lead to eight's hell. #they're spies. they're not from some different planet #but at the same time...I suppose he's hard to look at when you're someone like theron. who does not want to forget what it means to live #to forget your personhood... #there's the actual idea of a spy (a tool) vs an idealistic vision of a spy (a person at the same time) #and I think theron embodies the other half so the horrifying aspect of being one occasionally brushing against him #like the curious touch of a passing sea beast that you can't see under your boat #kinda shakes him #eight is very much a personification of the horrors of espionage #people also tend to be much more scared of what they think is duplicity behind a kind veneer #theron isn't some naive babe in a cradle unknown to these horrors #but he still balks at killing. at betrayal. #he holds very tight to his idea of right bc i think if he didn't have that he'd have nothing #is this your friend? or your cautionary tale?