The wary hesitation flicks through him at that, there a moment and masked the next. He doesn't want Logan to misunderstand the source; the older man's right in that they don't communicate well. How can they? Look at who they are, look at the history between them. Daken is still unlearning more than fifty years of programming.
"I'm nearly eighty," he reminds him, gentler than he usually allows himself to be with Logan. Gentleness still--sometimes--feels like weakness, like something that should have been beaten out of him a long, long time ago. "I don't remember any other name." He scrapes a thumbnail over the peeling label on the bottle, head tilting, and reaches up to push loose dark hair behind an ear. "Most people in X-Factor call me Akihiro." It makes them more comfortable than Daken, and he finds he doesn't mind it.
Names are important. This is.. something important, maybe, to Logan. There's little of Itsu left in the world; Daken resembles her, but the similarities begin and end in physical appearance. But.. "You can call me by the name she intended if you like. I'll.. try it out. With you." He won't promise to use it with anyone else, but it seems a small concession, considering.
It behooves him, Logan thinks, to try to do for Daken what people couldn't for him.
To Logan's eyes, Daken does resemble his mother so much sometimes it's hard to see anything but whole life none of them ever got a chance to live.
Still, he shakes his head gently at the offer. He knows it might read as stubborn, or fickle to refuse such a personal gift as the offer he's just been made, but he's determined not to throw off the tenuous balance between who they are to one another and who they could be.
"I don't wanna tell you who you are, son," he says. "I don't wanna call you anything that makes you feel like a stranger. I don't want to name you after the ghost of a child. I don't want you to go by something because it makes me more comfortable. None of those seem fair to you." He shrugs a little. Maybe some day they'll both find more of that boy they both lost when Itsu was taken. But for now, he'd just like to relieve the man of feeling like there's anyone he ought to be. "What do you want me to call you."
'Son.' It still sounds.. wrong, in a way. It's just a word, nothing Logan doesn't use with a dozen young men he's mentored over the years, but it's different when it's Daken he's using it with. Daken has never been anyone's son, not really. He and Logan are testing the boundaries between them bit by bit, but he can't say he knows what any relationship between them will look like. It's been defined by violence for so long, even here on Krakoa, that he's not sure he can imagine another way.
But this is.. unexpected. What does he want to be called? He's been Daken for so long, it's lost its meaning to him. It's just a name, just his name, just a word repeated so often that it sounds like nonsense. But he sees the effect it still has on other people, can smell it on them, taste it in the air: disdain or discomfort or guilt. Krakoa is supposed to be about new beginnings, and what kind of man wants to be known as a rabid mongrel? It's been a long, long time since he was that miserable child.
"Akihiro," he says finally, blinking once, painted nails tapping against glass. "For now. I don't--" His lips part, flatten thin for a moment. "I haven't thought about it yet, not really. I have.." He trails off, glance finally flicking away from Logan's face. He lifts the beer, takes another sip to give himself a few more moments to collect his thoughts. "I keep finding other things to.. fix. Layers and layers." For a moment, he looks exhausted, weary grief in the set of his mouth, but he ducks his head to hide it, rubbing his free hand over his brow. "It's occurred to me that I don't know how to be a person. Not in the way Laura didn't know, it's.. different." He doesn't even know if he's making sense, and he's fairly certain this wasn't the conversation he thought they needed to have.
"Aki," he nods at that until a flash of reproach crosses his own expression for being too familiar already. "Akihiro," he tries again. It's a white flag if ever there was one.
It's almost comforting to hear Akihiro speak like this. To hear him asking the same kinds of questions Logan has asked himself for years. The only thing he wishes it that he had better answers for his son. Maybe it's not necessarily the words Logan anticipated exchanging here but it's certainly adjacent and might at least give them more shared vocabulary.
"It takes a long time," he says. "Time I've had and still, I catch myself acting more like a solider than a friend. You can't just break a man of that kind of instinct overnight. Be patient. And find people who'll be patient with you."
It feels nearly as strange to hear Akihiro from Logan as it does to hear 'son,' especially after he corrects himself that way. Trying to be.. accommodating, he supposes. Respectful, maybe, of his ongoing journey to define who and what he is.
What he says isn't anything Daken hasn't told himself, of course. It's like he'd said: he's nearly eighty. By anyone's standards, he's old, even if he doesn't look it, doesn't seem to be. He's old enough, he's intelligent enough, educated enough to know that a lifetime of programming by a monster, a lifetime being a monster, isn't easily wiped away. And yet.. he's working at it anyway, trying to.. heal. Be better. It's the first time in his life he's had the chance to do so, the desire to do so.
"We're both very self-destructive," he says at last, "you and I." They all are, their family, perhaps because they can't die. Not really. They always, always seem to come back.. eventually. He taps his nails against the bottle again, drains it and sets it aside, straightening up where he's seated. ".. So. If the reason, your reason, isn't because of me, because I'm trying to be.. better--and I have to assume it isn't because of Laura or Gabby--then.. it's because of you." His head tilts, brows lifting questioningly, expression as open as he knows how to make it. "Why do you not want to be involved?"
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"I'm nearly eighty," he reminds him, gentler than he usually allows himself to be with Logan. Gentleness still--sometimes--feels like weakness, like something that should have been beaten out of him a long, long time ago. "I don't remember any other name." He scrapes a thumbnail over the peeling label on the bottle, head tilting, and reaches up to push loose dark hair behind an ear. "Most people in X-Factor call me Akihiro." It makes them more comfortable than Daken, and he finds he doesn't mind it.
Names are important. This is.. something important, maybe, to Logan. There's little of Itsu left in the world; Daken resembles her, but the similarities begin and end in physical appearance. But.. "You can call me by the name she intended if you like. I'll.. try it out. With you." He won't promise to use it with anyone else, but it seems a small concession, considering.
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To Logan's eyes, Daken does resemble his mother so much sometimes it's hard to see anything but whole life none of them ever got a chance to live.
Still, he shakes his head gently at the offer. He knows it might read as stubborn, or fickle to refuse such a personal gift as the offer he's just been made, but he's determined not to throw off the tenuous balance between who they are to one another and who they could be.
"I don't wanna tell you who you are, son," he says. "I don't wanna call you anything that makes you feel like a stranger. I don't want to name you after the ghost of a child. I don't want you to go by something because it makes me more comfortable. None of those seem fair to you." He shrugs a little. Maybe some day they'll both find more of that boy they both lost when Itsu was taken. But for now, he'd just like to relieve the man of feeling like there's anyone he ought to be. "What do you want me to call you."
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But this is.. unexpected. What does he want to be called? He's been Daken for so long, it's lost its meaning to him. It's just a name, just his name, just a word repeated so often that it sounds like nonsense. But he sees the effect it still has on other people, can smell it on them, taste it in the air: disdain or discomfort or guilt. Krakoa is supposed to be about new beginnings, and what kind of man wants to be known as a rabid mongrel? It's been a long, long time since he was that miserable child.
"Akihiro," he says finally, blinking once, painted nails tapping against glass. "For now. I don't--" His lips part, flatten thin for a moment. "I haven't thought about it yet, not really. I have.." He trails off, glance finally flicking away from Logan's face. He lifts the beer, takes another sip to give himself a few more moments to collect his thoughts. "I keep finding other things to.. fix. Layers and layers." For a moment, he looks exhausted, weary grief in the set of his mouth, but he ducks his head to hide it, rubbing his free hand over his brow. "It's occurred to me that I don't know how to be a person. Not in the way Laura didn't know, it's.. different." He doesn't even know if he's making sense, and he's fairly certain this wasn't the conversation he thought they needed to have.
no subject
It's almost comforting to hear Akihiro speak like this. To hear him asking the same kinds of questions Logan has asked himself for years. The only thing he wishes it that he had better answers for his son. Maybe it's not necessarily the words Logan anticipated exchanging here but it's certainly adjacent and might at least give them more shared vocabulary.
"It takes a long time," he says. "Time I've had and still, I catch myself acting more like a solider than a friend. You can't just break a man of that kind of instinct overnight. Be patient. And find people who'll be patient with you."
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What he says isn't anything Daken hasn't told himself, of course. It's like he'd said: he's nearly eighty. By anyone's standards, he's old, even if he doesn't look it, doesn't seem to be. He's old enough, he's intelligent enough, educated enough to know that a lifetime of programming by a monster, a lifetime being a monster, isn't easily wiped away. And yet.. he's working at it anyway, trying to.. heal. Be better. It's the first time in his life he's had the chance to do so, the desire to do so.
"We're both very self-destructive," he says at last, "you and I." They all are, their family, perhaps because they can't die. Not really. They always, always seem to come back.. eventually. He taps his nails against the bottle again, drains it and sets it aside, straightening up where he's seated. ".. So. If the reason, your reason, isn't because of me, because I'm trying to be.. better--and I have to assume it isn't because of Laura or Gabby--then.. it's because of you." His head tilts, brows lifting questioningly, expression as open as he knows how to make it. "Why do you not want to be involved?"