andyougoleft | |: 007. Video : The Long Drive Home is Taking Its Toll :|

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|: 007. Video : The Long Drive Home is Taking Its Toll :|

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     [Slevin is back in his cabin; he looks... vaguely threatened, but only because he found this in his closet. It blinks white and blue and green and red reflecting off his face even when he lowers it to address the network.]

     Biological terrorist attack, word salad, and cruel and unusual wardrobe punishment aside - and I'm not wearing this, by the way, ever - there's supposed to be a religious aspect to this time of year. I'm not even going to pick one, I just haven't seen that part of it addressed.

     Is anyone planning on holding any kind of service?  Doesn't matter what denomination or even religion, really. Can anyone?

    [ Private : Cassel Sharpe ]

    Do they have Christmas where you're from?


    [ Private : The Admiral ]

    [Slevin's list comes both in text and with bullet points. Deal with it. That's what you get for ~compelling~ him.]

Chris D'Amico: cologne and hair gel. nicer than his brand.
Cassel Sharpe: a cat palace.
Harvey Dent: cuff links - mismatched.
Iris Wildthyme: a leg lamp.
Kara Zor-El: a new dress, in that style she really likes. a nice one.
Abigail Hobbs: a penlight.
Erik Lensherr: itching powder - not in his clothes.
Kevin Prentiss: better friends
Marquis de Carabas: a bungee cord
Hannibal Lecter: cyanide. in his morning coffee.

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[. . . Huh.]

[That's his entire mental response. "Huh." Slevin has been hanging out more in public lately, but in a kind of . . . muscley way that Cassel doesn't completely trust. Or trust at all. What to do about it.]

[Besides answer the question, obviously.]

Yeah. All over the place. Technically I'm Christian, even, so I'm pretty familiar with it.

What, you need somebody to tell you the story of the Three Wise Men?

I wouldn't believe anything you told me about wise men.

[It's just that he's easing out of the Slevin persona he built for himself when he first arrived; not entirely, he's still not himself, but he already issued an open-ended contract to the Barge as a whole. He can afford to be a little more Henry, a little less Slevin.

He certainly seems trustworthy. Or at least like he's not particularly contemplating being untrustworthy. Mostly he seems... well, disturbed, as he searches for the off button on the sweater, for one.

For two:]

No, I don't need anything. I'm not religious and I don't celebrate holidays. Do you put up a tree?

Good, 'cause I don't know any.

[Disturbed. Why? And - I don't need anything. He doesn't understand this line of questions. It's confusing and strange and unsettling. His eyes narrow.]

I used to. I don't anymore. What do you care?

[The bare bones of bantering are enough to camouflage Cassel's distress, up to a point. And that point is his final question. Slevin glances up from his search and levels a curious, direct stare through the communicators at Cassel, his tone more deliberately sarcastic for just a moment.]

Because I'm pretending to be working towards graduation, obviously.

Why do you think?

[Well, if he wasn't suspicious before, he sure as hell is now. It's impossible to tell where the sarcasm begins and where it ends, and he knows that he's being fucked with. It pisses him off.]

[But - what was it Kon said? Anger's just other things covered up. He watches Slevin for a little bit in silence, thinking about this, and actually figures it out fairly quickly. It's fear. He's afraid of Slevin. What Slevin could do to him, but also losing him. Even though there really wasn't much built up to lose him from - there was something.]

I think you want to fuck with me. And it's working.

[It's a struggle to admit that, but he does it, growling a little and fidgeting with the hem of his glove. Slevin is better at this than Cassel is - than Cassel-as-he-has-become is. It's uncomfortable, unsafe, awful. But it is what it is.]

Of course it is. It's what I do. I fuck with everyone I meet.

[It is, both intentionally and unintentionally, meant as a kind of reassurance: Cassel is not, in this at least, special enough for Slevin to need or want anything specifically from him. He is special, of course, in many other ways. He is the best suited person to the task Slevin is trying to decide how to lay out for him without showing all the cards in his hand.

First thing's first: Slevin stuffs the sweater under his comforter so it won't distract him and shakes his head. Some of the gloss goes out of his gaze, replaced by something more acceptable, something not exactly warmer but adjacent to it. Something less dangerous by the estimation of most.]

Calm down. I just talked to Chris.

Don't tell me to calm down.

[Don't act like it's not something in particular, either; Cassel's interacted with him enough to know it's not. He's not stupid, not entirely. Just dense, sometimes, slow on the uptake, the way normal people act and react and interact.]

[Slevin's not normal, but he acts normal better than Cassel ever did.]

So tell me why you're asking me about trees and shit.

[Slevin isn't exactly surprised when Cassel refuses him; it doesn't happen often, but he's usually using more finesse than this, too. At least at the stage of the game where his mark is still hissing and spitting at him in desperate defense. But Cassel knows when he's being finessed; a player past a certain level always knows when they're being played, and it doesn't matter who is better than who.

It's just that he's picking up the signal from a much deeper motivation than he can possibly know. At least, as long as Slevin is doing his job. He snorts.]

Because I need a warden. The Admiral doesn't listen to inmates, not for things like this.

You and I don't do the holiday thing anymore, but Chris did. His family did.

Did.

Last year, these things came with prizes. Only for those brave enough to wear them, of course.

[And Selina isn't. Nope. One year was enough. Acrylic sweaters don't go with leather and latex.]

I really can't imagine what kind of prize could get me to put this on and actually walk around in it.

[Says the man who owns a green diamond pattern sweatervest. But that's it's own story.]

So you want to throw Chris a Christmas party and deck the halls so he doesn't feel super sad about missing his asshole dad. You.

[He doesn't buy it, and that's clear from his tone. There's an angle here. There has to be. Just because Cassel likes Slevin doesn't, by any stretch of the imagination, mean he trusts him. Slevin isn't trustworthy. This is something other than what it seems.]

It's not your job to take care of him, you know. And you don't seem like the sentimental type anyway. Just this sense that I get.

I don't want to throw Chris anything except, periodically, over the starboard rail.

I thought you might want to know that he actually told me - me - that he misses Midnight Mass and his fucking Christmas tree. People don't tell me those things.

[He isn't trustworthy. But what he does do is gather information, find the weak points to attack, the ways in. Chris is an easy mark, but Slevin is under no illusions about their relationship. He lifts his chin and stares right back at Cassel, cool and collected.]

I'm not the sentimental type. That's why someone that actually gives a shit about him might want to take over.

Or don't. I don't give a fuck. But I know when your family is used to doing these kinds of things, and then you hit that day and they're not there to do them anymore, it's a punch in the gut even if you never admit to it.

[Which is, of course, Cassel's major weak point other than his own self-destructive tendencies. Everything sharp, mean, suspicious about him goes soft and concerned; he even almost smiles, but not quite, he's still got that much control over himself. What Chris wants, what Chris needs but won't ask for, those are things that it's up to Cassel to provide if he can.]

He'd admit it.

[Soft and a little distracted. He's already planning, in some small corner of his mind. Not that he wasn't thinking about it before, but - now it's concrete.]

He'd whine about it. Can't have that.

What do you want? Nothing?

Nothing viable.

[This with the appropriate dry twist to it. Of course there are things he wants. There's not much anyone here can do about granting any of them, though.

But he shrugs, watching the suspicion bleed into something else. He nods to himself, mostly, seeing that Cassel will take it from here. That much of the entire thing, anyway, is sound.

Of course it is.]

I want my warden to whine as little as possible.

I can make that happen for you. Or I can try, anyway. You do realize not having his family around is going to fuck him up, Mass or no Mass.

[Which, well, Cassel knew that already. It comes around periodically, like a wave, Chris missing his family - Cassel missing his, in his own, quieter, more shrunken-in way. But their families were pretty monstrous, all things considered. Slevin's wasn't.]

[Plus, Slevin's have been dead for longer. It's not comparable.]

[It's been much longer, of course, and in some ways that's easier. It's easier here and now. He's learned to operate around it, for the most part, at least as much as someone that's been planning since the day he really understood it to take down everyone that even touched his parents' murder can. That doesn't mean he misses them any less.

That doesn't mean he misses Goodkat any less, and maybe he isn't dead, but Slevin certainly is at this point. Not that any of that comes through, not that there's even any outward sign that any of it exists. Slevin rolls his eyes.

They're all dead or orphans or both.]

It had occurred to me. Oh wait, that's what I've been saying.

I told him it's never going to be the same, so he can either try something new or take it as it is anyway. I don't know which he'll do, but the point stands.

Not even for a little free time?

[But then she snorts and shakes her head] I wore it last year, let's just say the finish line wasn't spectacular enough to get me to put one on this year.

Depends on how free the free time is. With the way the rules are around here, I highly doubt there's anything significant to be gained through unfortunate wardrobe decisions.

...Though I guess we'll find out once my warden is up and running.