Riding The Range

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WHO: Joshua and Nika WHEN: Two weeks on the ground


Lucifer's Landing, Angel Two weeks after landing

****

Sitting on the back of the roan mare, Nika looks more at home and more relaxed than Joshua may have ever seen her. A pair of sturdy tan pants topped by a black tanktop, her blond hair pulled up not into a braid but a ponytail, she even has a bit of a tan. Two weeks in Christian's care seem to have allowed for far more than a metaphorical letting down of her hair -- the customary pinned up braid has been nowhere in evidence for the past few days except when she's actually working outside and it needs to be confined, and even then it still hangs loose about her hips instead of being up out of sight.

As they ride along the pasture, the pilot is still quiet -- though her guard has relaxed visibly, she still isn't much of one for chatter. She's spent the past week teaching him to fly Christian's shuttle and also how to ride horses and properly shoot both a pistol and a rifle. When he balks, she gives him The Look and merely says, "When we next run into Reavers, you'll be glad I'm being such a bitch about making you learn it. Now shoot." Each of these passtimes is, in its own way, a place where she is in her element, it seems.

Joshua felt comfortable riding alongside Nika - while it had been a long while since the riding he had done for a Blue Sun job, it had seemed to stick with him. And one of the subtle, generally overlooked Reader abilities was his ability to get a general feel for animals. They didn't shield themselves like humans and while he was obviously never going to get advanced thought processes from his horse, he certainly could always get a rough sense of how she was feeling. He was less thrilled about the forced shooting lessons. He listened and paid attention - there was no point in throwing up a fuss. Secretly, he mentally confirmed his plan to find a way to make himself combat useful without a gun. He hadn't changed from his original perspective: Learning how to use a gun just encourages you to find a way to use it. Not that he would tell that to Nika. As they pulled up for a momentary stop, Joshua looked over at Nika, who was clearly more relaxed than she had been in weeks. She had needed this, even if she hadn't wanted to admit it. "You're looking good, Nika. Regular riding obviously suits you."

A rueful smile twisted the corners of her lips upward. "I reckon," Nika drawled mildly. Turning her mount slightly with a light touch of reins and heels, she pointed east. "There's a creek about a klik that way. We can water the horses before we head back." She set them in motion again, not at the canter they were using previously but at a more sedate walk. Her body rolls with the movements naturally, and her blue eyes scan the landscape often.

"You ever goin' to tell me what's on your mind, Joshua? Or you just goin' to stew over it and chew on it til you explode?" It hadn't escaped Nika's notice that he tended to watch her thoughtfully when he didn't think she could see him. The Border drawl had begun flavoring her words a lot lately, not in the way that would make Rina say 'Run! Danger!' but in a way that bespeaks a kind of contentment.

Joshua laughed, a healthy laugh straight from the heart. "This crew doesn't beat around the bush, that's for sure." He raised one side of his mouth in a bit of a smirk. "If I'm keeping to myself, it's only because I'm following your example." He couldn't resist the chance to take a little poke at Nika.

"Ffft," Nika retorted mildly. "Keep it to yourself, then." Her tone didn't indicate any disgruntlement. She was simply offering him the opportunity to tell her whatever it was that he was mulling. She doesn't seem to inclined to divulge her thoughts, and for about half of the distance to the creek she remains quiet. When she finally does speak, her words may or may not be a surprise. "We're all handling what happened in our own ways. I don't reckon that pissin' and moanin' about it is goin' to change anything, and I keep to myself because I don't need my feelin's bleedin' over and causin' you problems." What with his medication issues.

He looked over at her and tilted his head in surprise. "Is that why you don't want to talk to me? Because you're afraid you'll cause me problems? I'd rather you let me be your friend and listen. I can worry for myself about my own mental health. I'm getting better at keeping the door shut even going light on the drugs." He was just thankful Christian had been thoughtful enough to stock up on Flomoxipan. Getting out to get some these days could've been difficult.

Nika looked surprised, pulling her mount to a stop. "Not talk to you?" She mulled over that thought and said, "Joshua... I don't much talk to anyone. It's not as if I'm singling you out to not talk to. I just haven't had much to say lately. Why would you think I don't want to talk to you?" She didn't look like she was going to move her horse until she had an answer to that.

"I don't know." The tone of Joshua's voice had the faint hint of surprise, like he was just now realizing he wasn't sure why he had said it. Why had he said it? He scanned through his memory, looking for some clue, but not coming up with anything tangible. "I honestly am not sure why I thought that. Maybe it was just reading too much into the way you act around me. I know I freaked you out back on the Decatur and I think that knowledge paints how I view your interactions with me, even if it is subconscious. You don't share much and I read that as you being nervous around me instead of that just being who you are." And as was his habit lately when he was nervous, he ran his hand over the back of his head while looking down. "I'm sorry. There were just lots of reminders before we hit ground of how freakish I am and it does influence how I expect other people to look at me. But I shouldn't. Sorry."

Her brows pull together faintly. "You didn't freak me out, as you put it," Nika responded. "It simply made me conscientious of ... how much of what happens to other people could be a problem for you. And I'm still finding my space legs with regard to how to handle myself." She kicked her horse into motion, quiet for a short distance. "When you call me 'captain,' I feel self-conscious. As if I need to re-examine everything that I've just said because of the deferral. When Rick said it, he was.... sarcastic most of the time. Both circumstances feel awkward and uncomfortable. I'm learning to fake it, but I don't think I'm nearly good enough at it yet."

"But everyone can't keep their emotions bottled up all the time because it might be a problem for me. You just can't." It felt rude to think that people were being too thoughtful, but weren't they? All he wanted was the crew to live their life and to treat him like a normal person. But maybe it was silly. He was never going to be a normal person. He pulled up alongside her. "I call you captain because you deserve it, Nika. I'd rather you didn't suppress how you feel because I'm around or change what you say because of what I call you."

It took until they reached the creek for Nika to be able to formulate a response to him.

"You say that as if my normal mode of existance is to wear my heart on my sleeve and as if no one changes their mind about something because of someone else's perspective. Both of which are erroneous," she said as she dismounted, leading her horse to the water to let her get a drink. "You are the first person to ever call me 'captain'. It feels odd to be in the position, and to have someone use the title seems... pretentious to me. Uncomfortable. Like wearing someone else's shoes. It did not help that Rick took on that particular tweak of yours, and I assure you that he did not mean it in the same way that you do. It was his way of .... kicking me in the ass."

Nika paused and smiled faintly while the horse drank. "And I don't make a habit of explaining my feelings or sharing my thoughts with pretty much anyone, Joshua. I make the exception for you and Arden because you are both ... searching for a frame of reference, and the more information you have about why I think or react the way I do, the better you're able to determine your own perspectives."

"Gorram, Nika, I don't want you to share your feelings with me out of some need to make sure I have some sort of proper frame of reference." Whatever the hell that meant. "The only reason I want you to share with me is because I think it would help you to have someone to talk to. Because I care about you and I'm your friend, I hope. Being Captain doesn't have to be a completely lonely state of being." Joshua shook his head almost imperceptibly. How the hell had he managed to turn a nice peaceful ride into an argument about sharing feelings, of all things? Suddenly, he understood that frame of reference comment. He wished he had some sort of idea whether this sort of thing was normal. ***

There was a sigh. She'd said it wrong again. Nika looked frustrated. "That's not what I said. Or at least... not what I meant," she replied. "I don't like to talk about myself. I don't like feeling like I'm whining, and when I want to talk things out, of course I turn to my friends. But as an example, Joshua..." She paused, clearly struggling once more for the right words to make him understand.

"To say to you that my heart hurts over what happened to Rick doesn't begin to cover it. But going into details about my regret and my feelings of responsibility doesn't get me anything except either you all reassuring me that it wasn't my fault and that Rick chose the sacrifice or commiseration because we all feel like crap that it happened the way it did. Neither of which, to be quite brutal about it, I really want to hear anymore. But you're my friend, and you want to listen and you want to feel like we're close.... and I feel like crap saying to you 'leave me the hell alone to just feel what I'm feeling and be done with it' because I know that makes you feel like I don't want you around. Does it make any better sense now?"

Hallelujah and praise be! Joshua gave a little internal jump of joy. She was actually talking to him. "Thank god you finally decided to say something that approximated what you really feel. It won't hurt my feelings to say 'leave me the hell alone' because at least then I know you're treating me like an equal instead of a child you need to protect."

He smiled at Nika as he guided his horse next to hers, giving his horse the water she had been wanting the last couple of minutes while he had been distracted. "I think you'd be surprised what being willing to go into details about how you feel might help you. And if you want to talk about it, I'm not going to sugarcoat things. That's not what I'm offering. But even if you don't want to talk about that, I'm trying to get you to understand that it is okay to rant sometimes and it is okay to whine sometimes and I'm offering to be that person who just gives you an ear for it without commentary or judgment. You think Shyla doesn't have someone that she can talk to?"

He mulled over what she had said again and put the last piece in place. "I'm not trying to do this because I 'want to feel like we're close', Nika. I'm doing it because I think you need it. And I *know* I'm pushing you out of your comfort zone to do something you don't like doing. But I think being Captain is going to break you down in the long run unless you adapt. It doesn't have to be me and you don't have to come running to share with every single thing you feel, for pete's sake. But you've put a lot of extra pressure on yourself. You're stronger than anyone I've known, Nika, but that doesn't mean you have to do this job alone."

Nika smirked faintly. "Pretty sure she unloads on Harry all the time," she commented dryly. "I just..." She paused. Perhaps she was too much like her mentor in some ways. Because that's what Christian was to Nika -- the person she whined to. Looking down at the creek, she faced the fact that part of her resented Joshua for trying to take that place even as she was forced to acknowledge that they were the ones who put him in that position. "I'm not trying to do it all alone," she said finally. "I just don't know how to whine about all this without being able to do anything to fix it." She's a little like a guy in that regard.

"Well, the point is that you whine first, get it out, and then get down to the business of fixing it, if possible." He ran a hand through his hair aimlessly and scratched the back of his head in thought. How to phrase this? "You probably think I'm trying to be Christian," he said, eerily mimicking Nika's thoughts without realizing it. "And there's some truth to it. I need to do his job. What he did for the ship is needed. But I don't want to be him. Im finding my own way. But regardless, I think you need someone. If you don't want it to be me, make it Arden. Make it Rina. Just make it someone."

And he quickly segued the conversation in another direction, thinking that he had probably pushed her about as far as he was going to on that subject. "Speaking of my job, what do you have planned for me? You've got something in mind with the piloting and the gun training." The training was what made Joshua think of becoming a Christian replacement. He remembered being on Angel last time and having Christian tell him stories about Nika training Christian in gun usage.

There was a faint smile as he echoed her thoughts. And he wondered why she tended to be concerned. Nika pursed her lips and looked toward the horizon as they stood at the edge of the creek. Like Boros in some ways -- wide open with a sky that went on forever -- she could find peace here in ways the Core never offered. "No," she finally answered. "Not something in particular. I just have a notion that you're goin' to need to be able to defend yourself. And maybe defend some of us." Her tone was quiet as she spoke, her blue eyes holding a faraway look. "In case you haven't noticed, it's a war out there. And whether you like it or not, we're part of it. I ain't sure we're done bein' a part of it yet."

"I don't know, Nika. I just watch Arden and well..." Joshua trailed off and looked away from Nika's eyes, thinking about how Arden's attitude towards violence and killing seemed to have grown more casual. He loved Arden like a brother, but if the doctor in the group had little objection to killing people, what would happen when Joshua started picking up a gun regularly? He knew it wasn't rational, but he felt like he was drawing some sort of line in the sand. If he honestly thought about it, he wasn't sure exactly why it felt so important not to kill anything. If he were to examine his file from Blue Sun, knowing now that they wiped clean many memories, he would probably find out he had killed in the past. But somehow, he felt like he was defending some part of himself by refusing to use a gun. Damn, if he wasn't an illogical bastard.

"Yeah," Nika replied quietly. Sadly. The changes in the man who'd spent a good chunk of time in her bunk bother her. Pretty immensely. "I understand why you don't want to do it. And I think Christian's the person to talk to about your thoughts on that matter -- I've not been without a gun at my side since the war, Joshua. It's a way of life for me. And maybe there's something to the adage that when all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a nail. I don't think we come at every problem prepared to shoot before anything else, but... we do tend to be ready to shoot last."

She paused a moment, not looking at him. "And while I respect the decision not to want to pick up a gun -- same as I respected Christian for not wanting to do it -- I also ain't aimin' to get dead just so you don't have to." Nika turned her blue eyes to him finally. "I need to know that if push comes to bein' shoved off the cliff, you'll fight back. Even if you hate it."

Joshua squared his jaw and looked her directly in the eyes. He wasn't going to back down from this - he had backed down enough in his life and let other people make his choices for him. Not anymore.

"If you think I'm lacking in courage, then maybe you don't know me very well. I'll fight back when it comes to it. But I have to find my own way to do it. I won't be able to live with myself otherwise." He shrugged his shoulders uncertainly. "What is that way? I don't know yet. But hopefully I'll figure out in all this downtime we have planned." He paused, and a soft, sad smile crossed his face briefly. "And considering I'm not completely in control of my faculties, perhaps making sure I'm not well trained enough to kill is a good safety precaution. Killing can't be undone."

"Great," Nika snorted. "If you go and turn Shepherd on me, Joshua, I'll kick you in the head." She rolled her eyes and lead her mount out of the creek.

"I don't think you're lackin' in courage -- I've watched you face down a number of foes and words have worked. I just want you to have a backup in case words ain't enough," she told him as she swung gracefully back up into the saddle. "Might never happen. But if I don't make sure you have the skills and you get dead, that's on me. If I do make sure and you choose to let 'em kill your silly butt? That's on you." She smiled at him faintly. "C'mon, little pacifist."

"No, it's on me either way," he said seriously. "I take responsibility for my own choices." And that was probably why he was so against guns. He had so many crimes against his name done without a conscious choice left to be redeemed that he couldn't afford to add any more done with free will to the list. "So where to, fearless leader?" he asked, climbing back on his horse again.


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