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"Thought we'd get today's check in outta the way. You look like you were in the middle of mullin' somethin' over."

He stops several feet away, hands empty and at his side, loose and relaxed for everything that he knew had happened. But this was always and only ever about Collins making choices, and Raylan was giving him the choice to tell him that something happened. Did he think the Irishman would? No, but that wasn't the point. The point was to keep giving him doors until he finally opens one. That and finding what pieces of JD's mask as he could, but that would hold.

Collins had stayed near the Entity's mask, and even picked up a few of the pieces in morbid curiosity, until the entire thing had disappeared a few minutes after the incident. Then he had wondered off elsewhere to find a more suitable place for his thoughts. There was no evidence of their altercation in sight within the immediate vicinity at least.

The Butcher's eyes narrowed suspiciously at Givens. "Is that why you're here?"

From his tone, it was clear he didn't believe Givens. He knew that John Doe was a warden and he knew that wardens were revived in a different manner than inmates and he knew that the Entity was different from most beings on this ship. He figured that it wouldn't take long for people to know what happened, not with the way people acted on this ship, not with how often announcements of recent occurrences happened here. Instant news was easy when the technology allowed for it.

"Same as I have been every day." A partial truth - he was here to see what was kicking around Collins' head today, but of course, Collins wasn't wrong. Raylan lied like he breathed, smooth and easy, and what made his lies so believable to most was that he continuously did exactly what he said he would.

"You're tenser today, tenser than usual. Did somethin' happen?" Another door. Another chance.

The casual doors placed gently in front of a guilty sinner might have been an appreciated opening for any other person but not for Collins. For Collins they were simply an irritating reminder that no matter what he did, he would always and forever be looked at with disdain and disappointment. He held no guilt and that was a fault to everyone but him. So for him, the gentle prodding was only a prelude for the other shoe to drop--and he only ever remembered it dropping painfully hard.

His scowl deepened and his tone turned into a low growl of barely contained rage. "Cut tha shite, bull. We both know why yer here."

"So somethin' did happen." Said as though it was determined through inference and not factual evidence.

"Tell me what happened."

Raylan's tone didn't change from the easy going, how's the weather kind of tone that he'd been using before, but there was something different in his eyes, a sharpening with his pointed focus.

Collins's hands balled into fists that white-knuckled immediately. The last time he spoke with his father, he hadn't allowed the man to finish. Punching, stabbing, throttling were all easier ways to deal with an irritating person than let them get to what they really wanted to say. If Givens's eyes sharpened with focus, Collins's contracted with anger.

"You know what happened. I ain't playin' yer game. Either get ta what ya came here fer or fuck off!"

Collins balls his fist and Raylan takes off his hat almost casually, looking it over before he tosses it to the side, into a chair where it will, presumably be safe. He knew the Language of the Angry, but he sure as hell wasn't going to throwing the first punch.

"I don't know what happened with you." His tone stays consistent. "An' so, I'm askin'." He glances at Collins' fist with a faint nod of his head. "Unless you feel talkin' with those are gonna get you somewhere." His head tilts a little. "It won't, but I understand the need to run the route."

"It don't matter! Stop askin'!"

He stalked up to Givens and it was hard not to throw the punch that would make him happy. His fists hurt from the tension building, from holding back. But while it wasn't better there was no sense in humiliating himself by phasing out of physical existence like some damn ghost and passing right through the object of his anger.

"Do what ya came here ta do!"

Nothing in Raylan's energy changes outside of the edges of his lips curling at the edges fractionally and briefly as his head straightens. This, he understood. This, he'd been weened and raised on. What Collins couldn't do reverberated through the violent parts of him like the song of promise. Raylan wasn't Irish but goddamned if he didn't fight with a similar spirit.

Collins didn't intimidate him in the slightest, Admiral restrictions or otherwise. His voice drops a little, what with the closeness, and his confidence doesn't waver.

"And what do you think that is? Punish you? Throw you around, maybe tell you how terrible you are, infer how good I am by proxy for layin' out a list of shit you already know? Would that make you feel better? Feel like that's what you deserve?"

While Collins's expression remained tensely upset throughout, it was the 'tell you how terrible you are' that got the twitch along his jaw. The following piece had his teeth practically grinding. The rest washed over him doing no more or less harm than anything else said. It was that phrase in the middle that got to him.

"No," he said and the weight on that one word was oddly calm as he answered the final question with blasé truth. "But it's what you think I deserve."

"You don't know a thing about what I think. You lump all us together, paint us with the same brush of bias and dismissal that you think we paint you with. 'Cause that's easier, right? No need to learn about anythin' other than your next mark, your next hit-" Meant it both the way of drug addiction as much as it's literal sense, but for now, Raylan didn't bother to clarify.

"And without one, you strike out at anyone you can get your hands on, like squeezin' the life outta them is gonna give you some kinda meanin'. All these questions I've asked, you still ain't answered a one. I think-," he says, putting a little emphasis on the 'think' part, "-you're tryin' to keep yourself too busy to look at why you do what you do."

He leans in a fraction.

"How close am I?"

"You think I've never thought about that? You think I haven't been told why?"

He had been told his whole life what a mistake he was. How broken he was. He knew that. He didn't agree with it. He called his skill with his hands a gift and he took pride in his work. And he never looked back.

This place wanted him to but he never needed that. He never needed justification for what he did. He was born this way, he would die this way. That he understood.

"I know why. I ain't like you. You can call it a curse if ya want, I call it a gift. And no sense in denyin' what's been givin'. I use what I got. I ain't afraid of it. I ain't hidin' it no more. I ain't lyin' or pretendin'. Never again."

"No, I call it part of bein' human. We're ugly, capable creatures. But it ain't a gift. It's the same thing any person could do, even if you try for the argument of 'art' which doesn't have legs to begin with. Congratulations. You kill folks. So do I. So has a billion different people over the ages. What I wanna know is why you opted to go after John this time."

It might not have sounded like a question, but it was and by his face and eye contact, he expected some sort of answer.

No, Givens didn't get it. That was all right, no one ever did. The acceptance was like a release and suddenly all the tension ebbed out of him. His expression turned cold and dispassionate, a lack of any emotion where previously there was so much. He looked bored and his tone took on the same quality.

He always found it easy to ignore what didn't interest him. And he was no longer interested in the same rote.

"Why not?" he asked plainly.

It was impossible to miss the sudden de-escalation, the sudden loss of tension and that meant that Collins didn't agree with Raylan on the 'gift' of being able to murder someone. Raylan didn't bother to change his posture or tone in the slightest.

"Mmhmm. Except that suggests to me that there wasn't a reason, not even 'why not'. Did you mean to kill him? Or did you get ahold of that mask and, likely not incorrectly, think it was just that?"

"I'm not allowed to, but that don't mean I didn't want to."

No sense in dodging around that truth. Collins saw red the moment he laid eyes on John Doe and not much else got a thought towards it. Maybe he got a little anxious with the possession; maybe he didn't realize he could kill the entity. But that didn't change the fact that he had always wanted to.

"That's not what I asked."

Raylan was, by and large, very specific with his words and normally, he'd let the answer go, come at it another way but in spite of the calm steely evenness that he maintained, the fact that Collins had murdered Neal, the way it was done, the way Neal was left was still a deep and ugly mark against him.

"I ask if you meant to do it. This ain't exactly a slit throat or a shot to the heart, if you know what I mean."

Edited 2024-01-13 01:08 (UTC)

"Of course not. That thing don't exactly have a throat ta slit or a heart ta shoot." Nor him the weapons to do that with, unfortunately. "But I sure as hell didn't grab tha monster ta be nice ta it."

Because that was also a thing he was doing now: disassociating the Entity from humanity. It was something he understood when he first encountered the creature, and it was a lesson he was keen to reinforce now that he was upset with the Entity. It had always been a monster and it would always be a monster. It was not a friend and it never would be. JD didn't exist. Nor Liam.

Collins sighed explosively. If the damn copper wanted words then so be it. "Yes, I meant ta throw it as hard as I could ta get it off me. It did it's little possession thing tha second I touched it and I told tha demon ta go fuck itself."

"Next time, just let it the fuck go," he says darkly before lifting a finger.

"But that means this wasn't a murder. This was an unfortunate accident done by an asshole. And that's my point. So whatever it is you're waitin' for, ain't no other shoe to drop. I've already talked to JD, and he's fine with your continuin' to work here in the library, so be grateful for that. I can't control out people are gonna react when they find out, but I can at least make it clear where you and I stand about it."

"Next time, I'll stomp on tha goddamn pieces. I'm not yer fuckin' dog!"

His jaw twitched in anger again but he kept most of himself under control this time. At least he wasn't yelling. After another moment of staring contest, he let out a huff of air explosively. "Yer an idiot," he declared and then apparently decided they were done here. He turned his back to Givens and walked away.

Collins was the fucking idiot and Raylan's temper finally gets the better of him, sending him long stepping forward to fist Collins up by the scruff of his jacket and shirt, pushing him forwards as he forces them to keep momentum. He had been trying to do all this 'the right way' and so far, it had gotten him fuckall in the way of progress.

"You're the asshole lookin' gift horses in their mouth," he snarls, shoving Collins at the back wall bookshelf with a goodly amount of force. "Stupid enough to be choose the hard way for the hellva it. You want me to beat your ass for it? Throw you in Zero? Tie you to the deck maybe so folks can get their kicks in and you can wallow in how bad it is for you when you're choosin' that shit?"

Collins grunted as he was assaulted and produced enough leeway to twist himself in Givens's grip so that his back hit the bookshelf instead of being shoved face-first into it. He immediately went for a grip on the lawman that would allow him to fight back via grappling should the need arise. He was practically growling as he stared up at Givens, teeth gritted and eyes glaring daggers, as he listened to the angry man.

This felt familiar. Even the words were close enough to old threats that they struck a chord with him. His grasp tightened.

"Do yer worst then, ya bastard! What do ya want from me? Ta lie? Ta pretend ta give a fuck about any of this? There ain't a person I've killed that I regret killin' and I won't start now. I sure as shite don't regret killin' that monster, and I won't regret killin' you either."

Having fully let go of Collins as he was shoved, there wasn't much to grapple onto, but that didn't stop Raylan from leveraging his height and presence as he looms, eyes almost black in his temper.

"I want you to stop bein' such a fuckin' asshole for no goddamned reason. My not punishin' you for John ain't to 'make you my dog'-" he says, face pinching with a slight drawback in plain and obvious disgust and dismissal. "And if that's all it takes to get you on a collar to behave like a good little boy, then you're a hellva lot more stupid than I though. Guess what Collins, you ain't gonna die here, no matter how much you beg the rest of us to put you outta your fuckin' misery, and you're welcome to try to kill me; I'm happy to put you in the infirmary as many times as you give me opportunity. Go on, keep shittin' in your own bed."

Raylan gestures off to the left with the last, with the same kinda tone you'd use on a dog, and with an almost palpable level of disgust.

Collins could leave, if he wants.

Collins didn't wait for more than two words to make it out of Givens's mouth. Without any physical constraint to hold him back, the killer retaliated for the manhandling. He threw a punch at Givens without holding back. This was a wild animal being cornered and fighting back. He was only seeing red.

Raylan had let go of Collins because he knows how he reacts when he's holding a punchable face, but Collins swinging at him made everything valid. He was glad he took off his hat too, with the way his head snapped to the side with the punch, but Raylan had been in more fistfights than he has counted and Collins didn't have shit on him for height or leverage.

There was no hesitation in Raylan's right, ringed hand coming to answer the punch, aiming downright for Collins's jaw. If it hits, Raylan follows it up with another in a rapid succession, following the momentum and keeping them close.

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