Bashou felt a swell of relief as they left the room for somewhere a little brighter; it manifested as a sudden cold sweat upon the back of his neck. He swallowed hard and pulled at his collar uneasily, hoping that he wasn’t giving too much away. Even though he was clean, there was something painfully tempting about the idea of filling a sink with cold water and splashing his face repeatedly - but he resisted. That could wait until he was alone.
For now, he was trying to concentrate, his gratitude for Proton’s advice fighting against a desire to just…lie down in a dark room. Not one of these dark rooms. Somewhere else. Somewhere soft and quiet.
“So, a lot of it is just…playing on people’s fears? Knowing how to use the power of suggestion, or something like that…?”
Bashou knew that he was paraphrasing, but it made him feel better to reduce the whole nasty business to something simple. If that was the case, maybe he could do this job - if he had to. He’d have to learn a few things about reading people, but perhaps that would come with experience, and once he’d mastered that, maybe he would never find himself in here, washing his hands.
At that thought, his gaze became fixated on the unusual scars that decorated Proton’s fingers. How did he get those? For the next minute or so, his colleague’s words became a muddy sea of noise that washed over him.
…they glaze over, like they’re not really there anymore…
“I think I would do that. Glaze over, I mean. Just kind of…check out. I don’t know.”
He forced himself to come back into the room, glancing at his own reflection in the mirror to ground himself.
Oh. There was something else that he’d wanted to ask.
“If you know what you can take - not just you personally, I mean, anyone who works down here - then does that mean you’ve been…? Has it ever happened to you?” Recruitment through interrogation. That’s what he just said. Bashou’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Is that…how you ended up here? You don’t have to tell me, I just…wondered.”
“Something like that,” he waved his hand, as if to signify Bashou had understood the point well enough. “Exocet, my direct supervisor, almost never resorts to violence in his interrogations,” in his voice, there was an unspoken respect - of admiration - for his superior, “it can make things slower, though, if you have the kind of person who will break with a little bit of... encouragement.”
His eyes flicked back to Bashou, the blood washed from his fingers and wrung from his gloves, “It’s a good way to be, as long as you get someone who doesn’t get impatient with it,” his gaze fixed on him a bit longer, searching.
The line of work wasn’t for everyone. Bashou, at least as he was now, was not among the few cut out for it. That was fine. He preferred to show observers the violent confrontations, see how much they could stomach. At least Bashou wasn’t throwing up, and he didn’t look to be much paler than he’d been before.
“Hm?” More questions, and this time personal. Bashou, he realized, must have noticed the scarring of his hands.
“No.” It was a reasonable conclusion to come to, he supposed, and he might have given Bashou the wrong impression with one of his earlier statements. “My experience came from... something else. Most did, I think.”
Shoving damp gloves in his pockets, he made for the exit, and gestured for Bashou to follow. “My recruitment was pretty standard. Almost boring.” Curiosity suddenly piqued, he turned his attention back to the other. “You? Were you born into it, or sign up?”