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Spoke assumed that Leo would, like, be around more? He put all of this effort into capturing Spoke and Mapicc and then he just drops them into the LAW prison and abandons them? It’s kind of weird.
Well, to be fair, Spoke doesn’t know where Mapicc is. He doesn’t—he tries to ignore that fact as best he can, counting the tiles on the ground and counting the tiles on the walls and listening to the rhythm of the guards’ bootsteps. Thump-clink thump-clink thump-clink, footsteps and then the shifting of armor following the shift in weight.
Spoke misses Mapicc. Spoke misses Parrot. Spoke misses Minute, and Wemmbu, and Jamato. Spoke misses everyone. Spoke doesn’t want to be alone.
But he’s holding it together. Surprisingly well, actually. His mind has leaked all the way out of his ears and filled his skull with static so that he can’t think about Mapicc, really, or feel lonely, or feel sad. So it’s fine!
It’s a stress response, Spoke’s done it before. He knows it’s a stress response because in the spy area of BAT Jumper had these little pamphlets about preserving your mental health, and one of them said, “stress responses,” and had “overwhelming focus,” and “totally blocking out the stressor” as some of them. The pamphlet seemed to think that this was a bad thing, but Spoke finds it kind of. good. Better than any of the other ones. Better he shuts down here instead of, like, biting a guard. He knows that’s not going to get him far.
Instead, he puts all of his brainpower (which isn’t much, he suspects most of it has been diverted to violently suppressing all of his emotions) towards wooing his guards. They aren’t spies, which means that he can see their names and talk to them and he can’t trick himself, in his half-panicked state, into beliving he’s been captured by the mafia somehow.
And he’s a good little prisoner. Which was apparently the right decision, because it nets him a visit from Leo. Does he want that? Not particularly. Is it better than pacing around his cell/talking to highflier73 about the latest advances in middle reader detective fiction because all of his guards are children for some reason? Yes. At least, it’ll make him scared enough that he has a memory that he can press on if he wants to get an adrenaline hit, which would be pretty cool.
Of course, by “visit from Leo,” he means “getting dragged out his cell by three people in full netherite who pull out their swords if he even twitches (this is very bad for everyone involved because Spoke is very twitchy) all the way to a very scary, nondescript room that is pretending to be an office.” Spoke knows it is an not an office because 1) Leo’s office is in the BAT HQ, 2) there is no paperwork but a single manila folder in front of Leo, and 3) it has the block pallet of a torture chamber, and by that he means everything could be very easily wiped down, all stone and quartz, and there is a slight slope to the floor that leads down to a drain. For blood. Obviously.
Cool, Spoke’s going to get tortured. No, that’s fine. That’s great. He loves getting tortured. He’ll—He guesses he can poke at the wounds that Leo will probably leave once he goes back to his cell, which’ll be fun. Probably.
“Sit down, Spoke.” Leo has the beautiful ability to make Spoke feel like he is a burden no matter the situation, which is strange because Leo very clearly wanted him here. Still, Spoke sits.
“You have been an exemplary prisoner for basically the entire time you have been in our prison.”
Spoke ducks his head, trying to hide his blush. He doesn’t know what Leo is getting at and he doesn’t like that Leo is being nice to him, because he never does that—no one does that. Spoke doesn’t have his reactions nailed down for a situation like this. He can’t let Leo see how much this has effected him.
Leo stops for a second, which means that he definetley noticed what’s happening to him. Fuck. “And the LAW—” the LAW? Spoke wasn’t aware that he was under the jurisdiction of the law, he though he was here as like a prisoner-loan thing but still BAT’s…property. Which sounds bad when he puts it that way, he guesses. “has decided that you are a good candidate for rehabilitation.”
“I am?” Spoke’s voice is quieter than he remembers it ever being, and as much as he tries, and he can’t force any more energy into it. There’s nothing to bounce off of. The room is cold, and light glints off of what are 100% torture implements instead of pens in the little pen cup.
“You’re a criminal, of course, but we have analyzed your action patterns, and they seem to be motivated out of mostly a desire to not be caught in a lie, rather than any actual cruelty.”
Spoke swallows. Isn’t that pathetic? If it’s true. What, he killed god-only-knows how many innocent people because he didn’t want Leo to think poorly of him? But Spoke’s always been pathetic, and he’s always been honest to himself.
Leo flips open the folder, turns it around, and shows Spoke its contents. It’s what Spoke would expect from something like this. A lot of photos of his own actions, detailed reports on them, what look to be interview transcripts of people who have interacted with Spoke in the past.
“So if we make sure that you don’t start a lie, you won’t have a reason to double down and hurt more people.”
It’s better than Spoke could ever expect, which makes fear start bubbling up inside of his gut. Leo can’t be forgiving him that easily. He can’t. There has to be some kind of catch here. But even more, Spoke can’t jeopardize his position by asking Leo about that, because that means that Spoke doesn’t trust him. Spoke doesn’t trust him, obviously, but that will break his little goody-two-shoes persona in Leo’s eyes.
“And Mapicc, at least, has already agreed.”
“Mapicc?” Spoke’s head shoots up.
“Yes. If you acquiesce to the rehabilitation program, you will be allowed supervised visitation at least once a week, probably starting about a month after the start date. We understand that it is important for you to be around your peers, but also we want to minimize influences that reinforce dangerous behaviors.”
“So you—”
“You won’t be alone, though. I will monitor your rehabilitation and help you along the way, and there will be another person working with Mapicc. We understand regular social interaction is important, and so you will not be isolated.”
Spoke understands the wager, here. If he goes back to the main prison, he will go back to solitary. And solitary is, well, solitary. So there is only one option here that ends with Spoke and Mapicc in the same place, and with Spoke having an intact mind.
“I’ll do it.” Spoke really tries to avoid a voice crack, but that’s just a little bit of a lost cause. He’s overwhelmed by the new information, the fear he has been ignoring for the past several weeks, the sudden happiness of Leo not hating him!
He’s still not sure exactly what he’s getting into, but who cares? Who cares? It’s fine, it’s not like—it’s not like his life has been under his control for the past couple of months, either. This won’t change anything for the worse, and it might even change things for the better.
“Spoke.” Spoke stares at the desk, a sudden wave of fear crashing over him. He tries to ignore it, but that’s not really how fear works. He can’t. He can’t force himself to ignore it, as much as he can force himself to ignore his slight hunger pains and the deep, deep loneliness inside of him. “Look at me.”
But Spoke is being good. That’s the only way he’s going to be able to see Mapicc again. So he looks up.
Leo frowns, and then sighs. He stands up, his chair nocking against the table rattling the torture implements on the desk, and walks over to stand next to Spoke.
Ok, so is this where he’s going to be tortured? Spoke is genuinely a little baffled by the lack of torture he is going through here. Like, obviously, he’s happy about it, but still. What the fuck? Why did they have to have this conversation in the torture chamber?
“Give me a hug.”
No torture, then. That’s probably a good thing.
Spoke buries himself in Leo’s arms, and his body explodes into sensation, like his nerves are on fire. It’s good fire, though, if overwhelming. He tries to pull back, but Leo’s grip is stronger than his could ever be.
“H—hurts.” Spoke manages to spit out, because, right, no lying?
“Do you have a wound, or are you touch-starved?”
No lying. No lying. No lying. “Touch-starved.”
“Then it’ll be start feeling better, eventually. It’s not going to get better if you don’t face it.”
Shakily, Spoke nods into Leo’s suit jacket. That’s right. It’s not going to get better if he doesn’t face it. The only way out of this situation is through.
“I know you want to get better, okay, Spoke? I’m going to make sure that you get better.”
It hurts. Spoke wants to get out of Leo’s arms and rub the feeling of burning out of his nerves. He manages to stuff that feeling of pain down into heavy breathing and heavy breathing alone.
Leo notices, because of course he does. Nothing gets past him. He’s been watching Spoke for a long, long time. “You’re doing so good, okay?”
Spoke’s doing good. Spoke’s doing good.
“Do as much as you can, okay, but don’t hurt yourself.” Despite saying that, Leo does not let go. It feels good and it feels horrible, there is no fresh air to cut himself on, to use to stifle his thoughts and feelings.
Spoke begins to cry. Leo holds him through it, and his body is warm, even if what he says is stilted, almost scripted, and feels a little bit too fake to trust.