He was so tired of having this thrown in his face. Over and over and over. Dead kids dead kids dead kids Stamford Stamford Stamford. Like he was supposed to flagellate himself for something he wasn't even there for because he'd been risking his life fighting a war to save everyone asking the damn questions.
"All I can say is that I feel compassion for the victims and their families. I don't know what else is expected of me." A pause and he added honestly. "Although given what I've seen of public opinion, I'd hazard a guess that what people want is for me to flagellate myself and apologize for something I wasn't responsible for. Guilt by association, right?"
He sat forward.
"I was proud of being a New Warrior. I still am at least proud of what good we did do because we saved the world more than once. But I left before that went down. I wasn't comfortable with the producers calling so many shots in our superhero fights and told Thrash I felt like the focus had strayed too much from just doing our damn jobs protecting people."
For once in his life, the spotlight had made him uncomfortable. Justifiably so, apparently. Go figure.
"So when they called me back up to Xandar I went without a second thought." He tapped his own chest. "So if you're expecting guilt and self-recrimination, that's not happening anytime soon. And with this whole thing that keeps happening, people throwing dead kids in my face like I'm not caring enough...Look, I understand the tragedy of it, it's just there's a point in the last few years where I had to stop letting the thought of lost innocents overpower me so I could keep moving forward and do my job."
He leaned forward.
"I even even remember the day. It was when the nursery creches of Xintar 5 got knocked into their sun by the Annihilation Wave, despite the efforts of the United Front and the Xintarian military in trying to stop it. Over the comm lines we could hear the kids screaming and crying in the background of the distress calls by their caretakers. Millions of them. After the creches burned up, we lost half the Xintarians because they started running suicide runs into the sun because they couldn't bear the thought of living without their children."
There was dead silence now to match the quietness of his voice. It was lowered the way his father had always lowered it when he was at his most serious, when he was saying something important.
"If I seem at all aloof or cold about the kids at Stamford it's just that - it's that when you see dead kids by the shipload, if you let it get to you that hard every time, you can't do the job. I have to push past it to do my job and make sure things like that don't happen to kids again if I can ever stop it."
He pointed at her. "I keep getting those questions about the Stamford kids. Constantly. And while I feel for their families, with all due respect, Ms. Floyd, you'll have the right to throw dead kids in my face after you've had to crawl out from under a heap of rubble and the bodies of civilians on a world that died around you. Or when you fly in to save a school and can't tell how many kids used to be there because giant space bugs already reduced them to parts. So."
He sat back.
"That's all I have to say." He added, "Any more questions, Ms. Floyd?"
She was silent in response. Silent and pale.
"That's what I thought."
Nova took advantage of the silence to stand up.
"I'm done for the day. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain a few things. You can direct any other questions to the Defenders' public relations team."
cw: suicide, cw: dead kids
"All I can say is that I feel compassion for the victims and their families. I don't know what else is expected of me." A pause and he added honestly. "Although given what I've seen of public opinion, I'd hazard a guess that what people want is for me to flagellate myself and apologize for something I wasn't responsible for. Guilt by association, right?"
He sat forward.
"I was proud of being a New Warrior. I still am at least proud of what good we did do because we saved the world more than once. But I left before that went down. I wasn't comfortable with the producers calling so many shots in our superhero fights and told Thrash I felt like the focus had strayed too much from just doing our damn jobs protecting people."
For once in his life, the spotlight had made him uncomfortable. Justifiably so, apparently. Go figure.
"So when they called me back up to Xandar I went without a second thought." He tapped his own chest. "So if you're expecting guilt and self-recrimination, that's not happening anytime soon. And with this whole thing that keeps happening, people throwing dead kids in my face like I'm not caring enough...Look, I understand the tragedy of it, it's just there's a point in the last few years where I had to stop letting the thought of lost innocents overpower me so I could keep moving forward and do my job."
He leaned forward.
"I even even remember the day. It was when the nursery creches of Xintar 5 got knocked into their sun by the Annihilation Wave, despite the efforts of the United Front and the Xintarian military in trying to stop it. Over the comm lines we could hear the kids screaming and crying in the background of the distress calls by their caretakers. Millions of them. After the creches burned up, we lost half the Xintarians because they started running suicide runs into the sun because they couldn't bear the thought of living without their children."
There was dead silence now to match the quietness of his voice. It was lowered the way his father had always lowered it when he was at his most serious, when he was saying something important.
"If I seem at all aloof or cold about the kids at Stamford it's just that - it's that when you see dead kids by the shipload, if you let it get to you that hard every time, you can't do the job. I have to push past it to do my job and make sure things like that don't happen to kids again if I can ever stop it."
He pointed at her. "I keep getting those questions about the Stamford kids. Constantly. And while I feel for their families, with all due respect, Ms. Floyd, you'll have the right to throw dead kids in my face after you've had to crawl out from under a heap of rubble and the bodies of civilians on a world that died around you. Or when you fly in to save a school and can't tell how many kids used to be there because giant space bugs already reduced them to parts. So."
He sat back.
"That's all I have to say." He added, "Any more questions, Ms. Floyd?"
She was silent in response. Silent and pale.
"That's what I thought."
Nova took advantage of the silence to stand up.
"I'm done for the day. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain a few things. You can direct any other questions to the Defenders' public relations team."