just take my hand and be brave [ reid + daryl ]

[technophobics]

we'll say goodbye to this grave

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[technophobics]

"You could lie," Spencer agrees, taking the papers back and setting them on his lap. The pen gets tucked behind his ear again. "But I'd probably be able to tell if you do."

He's not as good of a lie detector as Hotch or Gideon or Rossi were, but he does okay. There's a lot of subtle signs that people give off if they're telling the truth or if they're lying: eye contact, the steadiness of their voice, the openness of their body language, how much detail they put into things.

He can tell that Daryl's not lying about being arrested for a violent crime because his answer is simple. Someone that was lying might feel the need to pad that out with details: of course not, I've always been a good person, I've always been charitable to my community. Daryl's simple no is very telling. He doesn't feel the need to defend his answer.

"If I asked the rest of your group about what they think of you, what do you think their answers might be?" he asks, fidgeting with a corner of the consent form, compulsively smoothing out a dog-ear of the page.

[vestigial]

Good that this conversation isn't happening months ago, while he was reeling from grief and drunk for the first time in years. He can still hear himself, Is that what you think of me?, cold and furious. Like an asshole. Ashamed of lashing out at someone who didn't deserve it, who just thought everyone had been in the drunk tank at least once.

Daryl is motivated to behave, now, no matter that he still seems standoffish. But he's had to be prepared to defend himself since he was a child, and he doesn't know how to turn it off. He may never; he may always seem like he could become hostile at any moment, even just sitting around.

His head tips. Observing Spencer. "That how you could tell?" Wry. "Gossip?"

Seems about as useful as lie detectors. But he shrugs, and answers anyway.

"Dunno. They've done alright by me, most of 'em. Like to think I've done the best I can in return."

He's underselling it, but he doesn't know that. Unaware of how much some people care about him, because he doesn't think he deserves it. Daryl's gaze falters and he looks away out at the street-turned-walkway. Plain, old-world insecurity. He doesn't care what broader society thinks of him, didn't then and doesn't now, but he cares about what his people think of him.

[technophobics]

Asking Daryl what the others think about him tells him nothing about what the others actually think of him, and everything about how Daryl perceives them to think about him. If he'd asked Daryl to describe himself, the answer would likely be perfunctory. This method of question is much more useful.

That little glance away is telling, since Daryl's gaze has been steady up until now. He desperately wants what he said to be true, but he isn't sure that it is. He isn't sure that his people would actually say something so kind about him. He comes off as self-assured, but there's some insecurity there.

It's not unusual. Spencer would like to think he's useful to this community as well, but some nights he can't sleep because he worries he isn't doing enough, stricken with guilt over sleeping instead of doing.

"Most of them?" he repeats curiously. On Hotch or Morgan, that question would have been a narrow-eyed taunt; on Spencer, it's a wide-eyed innocent question. Two very different methods that work on different people, and it's partially because Spencer knows he can't really pull off the whole steely eyed, grim-jawed serious thing, but partially because he knows his non-threatening demeanor is good for helping people open up.

He takes the pen from behind his ear again, spinning it between his fingers.

"So there's some of them that haven't done alright by you," he continues. "Are there any continuing feuds that might pose a danger to you or anyone else?"

[vestigial]

Daryl isn't difficult to read when someone knows what they're doing by looking, but he's effectively impossible to interrogate. Not a snitch. (Torture, physical and psychological, waterboarding. He doesn't crack. His hands don't shake.) The assumptions that the younger man is making, even if they were true, would never end up corroborated.

But. Daryl looks back at Reid, his gaze contemplative. Stormy blue eyes thinking about him and his eagerness to do things. Outside the walls scraping at willow bark despite clearly never having so much as gone camping before the turn, and now in here, doing these followup interviews while also soliciting participation in genetic research. Spinning plates. He wonders how much stale coffee Spencer drinks on the daily.

"Ain't what I meant."

He wishes he could ration another cigarette just to have something to do with his hands; he doesn't want to pull at his cuticles like a child. His fingers tap briefly on his knee, but he makes himself stop. Almost nervous. Communicating effectively past yes or no answers has never been his strong suit.

"Just don't know some of 'em well. The priest, the redhead, the chick with the busted arm. Folks we found on the road. I know Gabriel is fucking terrified of us, no matter we saved his life half a dozen times. Not his fault. He just wishes survival could be a kinder business, and being angry at the people doing the surviving is... easier than being mad at God, or whatever."

[technophobics]

"It's not an uncommon rationalization, these days," Spencer hums in agreement. He thinks that might be the longest few sentences he's gotten out of Daryl since they met, which is a great success! "It's hard to justify why a loving god would allow something like this to happen, so being mad at your fellow man is much easier. Or they rationalize it as being a trial from god, and it's easy to think everybody else is just unnecessarily making it harder."

So, he can probably tick off the 'not religious' box for Daryl, then. Spencer wonders if he ever used to be, before. A lot of people have lost their faith. Then again, a lot of people found it, too. Drastic circumstances makes for drastic change.

Still, it's good to know that Daryl doesn't seem to have any big conflicts with any of the people in his group. He doesn't even take it personally when a member is continuously scared of them despite doing everything he can to help, which is extremely even-tempered of him.

"Are there any feuds in your group?" he follows up, tone a little lighter than before. This one's not so much an interview question as it is plain curiosity. "We obviously can't mandate in the Forty-Eight that nobody has any arguments, but it's useful to know where the sources of strife are. It sounds nosy, I know, but the leadership does its best to mediate arguments over resources, if that's what any feuds are over."

[vestigial]

No comment about God. He wasn't ever especially concerned with the issue, and isn't now. Once a passive believer thanks to cultural habit, but these days, he finds it altogether unconvincing. In the face of what the world's become, he experienced a simple falling off without any psychological angst. It is what it is.

"Regular shit. Folks in close quarters get annoyed now and again."

He doesn't think anyone will confess anything dire. In fact, he'd be more inclined to anticipate his people closing ranks over even the most minor infractions. Barring, say, the aforementioned Gabriel, but even if the man decides to babble on about the violence he's witnessed, a few followup questions are bound to stump judgement. Yes, he's seen them murder other living humans brutally, he's seen executions and slaughters. Why? Oh, well, cannibals, slavers, rapists.

Kind of a wash.

"Your people got problems? Anything we should avoid stepping into by accident?"

Reid's probably not here to give an interview of his own, but fair's fair, Daryl thinks. Besides, the younger man sort of seems like the kind of guy who got his ass kicked a lot at school, no matter that now he's an FBI agent and someone in a position of authority at 48. Meaning he should have a good sense of who the assholes are, profiler or not.