genessia | [ action | closed ] counting bodies like sheep, to the rhythm of the war drums

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[ action | closed ] counting bodies like sheep, to the rhythm of the war drums

Who: Trahearne and Tannusen
Where: Genessia City - Garden Park Apartments - Trahearne's apartment
When: After the cure for Quiet Minds, but before the more recent Velvet Lust scenes w/ Tannu.
What: Tannusen goes back to Trahearne's apartment after everyone's cured.
Warnings: Tannu's a sad sack of cat.

When the tone -- and accent -- in the voicemail messages on his phone changed dramatically, Tannusen decided it was probably safe to return to the apartment. He was cautious, even so, and actually knocked on the front door instead of trying to go right in.

No longer able to teleport himself, he wasn't going to walk right over the top of any wells the sylvari necromancer may still be maintaining on the door!

Especially in his current condition. Tannusen didn't look... well. It was quite possible he hadn't eaten anything solid since coming back to life, and he certainly hadn't slept much.

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It was good that Tannusen knocked. The mark on the door was mostly to alert Trahearne to anyone trying to come in unannounced, the stun attached still wouldn't be fun to deal with. There was a faint flicker of magic as he approach the door and pulled it open a crack.

Tannusen. Tannusen looking like hell. Looking like hell wasn't a given that this was the correct Tannusen. Bright, cat-like eyes watched the fae for a long, searching moment before the sylvari's expression softened and he stepped back to let Tannusen inside.

"It's good to see you whole," he said, voice laced with concern.

He was either the full version or the 'good' version. The impatient, snappish, nastier half would have never stood there and been stared at like that without reacting.

But Tannusen didn't react to the staring, not at all. He wasn't even looking up.

"Is the catholic still here?" Priorities -- he needed to avoid Cassian as much as possible.

"No, he left for the cure as soon as it was available." His concern deepened when Tannusen didn't look up. It was so painfully unlike the fae to be anything less than put together and confident, or at least annoyed to justify him being anything else.

"Come in, please, Tannusen," he said in a softer voice. He felt ill from the sudden relief that Tannusen came back at all, it had eaten away at him that a friend was in danger and he was again unable to do anything. That wasn't a struggle he hadn't expected to face here.

Good, that was what he'd hoped would happen. Cured, and likely not inclined to leave his territory immediately. That gave Tannusen some time to get a few things in order before he possibly got shot in the face.

It wasn't like he'd try to fight it.

The tiger stepped in, and out of the way of the door being closed shut again behind him. "Sorry."

Trahearne felt a sympathetic pain in his chest. Regretful and troubled was a sad state to see Tannusen in.

"You did no harm to me, you kept part of Cassian safe, I do not think I'm owed an apology. I feel I owe you one, for my inaction. That is neither here nor there, I think you need rest more than words." And food. Trahearne was no cook but that's what microwaves were for.

"Staying out of trouble, and keeping the catholic out of trouble, is exactly what I'd hoped you would do," Tannusen shook his head, even his words were slower than normal. "I meant in general. I... know I'm a shit."

He went to sit down on the couch, and immediately gave into the urge to bundle himself up in one of the blankets. For reasons. His eyes fell shut, but he didn't lay down.

"I take it you still want me around."

Edited 2017-01-28 14:12 (UTC)

"Of course," Trahearne answered promptly. "You returning is far more valuable to me than an apology for silly matters."

Sometimes Tannusen was frustrating but who wasn't sometimes? As far as friends went, Tannusen was pretty decent. He cared in his own way and more than he showed, that note he'd sent with Cassian's better half showed that.

He looked over at Tannusen on the couch, wondering if he should say more, be properly comforting. Maybe this wasn't the time for him to try that.

"If you're able to eat, you should." Practicality was an easier approach. "There's leftover takeout... or sandwiches."

Tannusen would have been grateful, if embarrassed, to hear that estimation of himself as a friend.

Being direct was too hard, for too many reasons.

"I can't," he could, but he didn't want to. "I haven't eaten anything solid since I woke up. It's probably a new stomach."

Actually, a lot was probably new. All of it? His scars were still there; assorted aches and pains from a short life lived very rough, but there was no way it was the original.

Not when he'd woken up and found three days had gone by.

"I... died. I've been back to myself for days, now."

"Ah." That was a question Trahearne hadn't wanted to ask. How does one ask if someone had died, really? It was rude, at best.

"How are you?" That he had to ask. Tannusen wasn't doing great, not at all. He didn't want to see Cassian at all despite going out of his way to save him and then there was dying. That was a harder subject to tackle. The best Trahearne could do was try to get something more out of Tannusen to work with.

Tannusen was plenty grateful to not have to explain why it'd taken until now for him to show up. It was pretty obvious who he was avoiding, but that hadn't stopped people from asking before.

Even if he was bundled up in the blanket the catholic had used. It was... complicated. He certainly wasn't avoiding the guy out of a dislike for him.

For himself, yes. But not for Cassian.

"Fine," not fine, at all. "I don't want to spew angst at you, there's nothing to be done about it. Did anyone come looking for trouble?"

"It often helps to share that 'angst' even if there's nothing to be done. I'm willing to listen." He watched Tannusen, what there was of his brow under the seedpods was wrinkled with worry. With a faint sigh, he looked away and turned to go into the kitchen. It was easy to see him in the gap in the wall between the kitchen and living room.

Harder to see what exactly he was doing. There was a clatter as he pulled a pot from cabinet and the sound of running water. He set the pot on the stove and left it to heat up, returning to the entrance of the kitchen and leaning against the wall.

"And no, no one came to bother us."

Tannusen took his boots off, so he could pull his feet up onto the couch without getting dirt on it. Funny how much dirtier his boots got now that he walked everywhere again, instead of just teleporting half the time. "I don't know what you've heard, but apparently it was in the Nova City water supply."

He hadn't figured anyone else would come looking for his roommate, but someone might have wigged out on the whole building for all he knew. It didn't sound like anyone else had gotten particularly violent, though.

"Yes, it was the work of some scientist angry he wasn't allowed to experiment on citizens. So he experimented on citizens." Trahearne shook his head. While some might be criticizing officials for not handling the guy sooner, nutters like that would keep cropping up. With how much trouble this world generated, something like the water incident was bound to happen.

"As far as I know, he's been taken care of. It was settled by the time I could've done anything myself." So he felt pretty useless during the whole thing.

But Tannusen could read between the lines, himself. "You kept yourself and the catholic safe. It may not have been a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but I'm glad anyway. I don't have a lot of friends."

Look at that admission... between the lines.

Trahearne appreciated the admission, it was downright brazen for Tannusen when it came to the fae admitting feelings of any kind. His "good" half had spoiled some of the mystery with that note. He wasn't about to say that, no need to push Tannusen on silly things like that.

"In return for watching Cassian I just ask you keep yourself relatively safe. I have few friends myself, I don't want to worry that you won't come back next time." Do what you like Tannusen, but maybe try to be healthy. For the most part.

Trahearne went into the kitchen again to pull a small container from a cupboard and drop something into the boiling water. That done, he was back at the doorway.

"I can't promise that," Tannusen murmured, eyes closing again. Just add it to the long list of things he had to apologize for, Trahearne. "I fully expect to get a shotgun blast to the face, when this is all over. I've certainly earned it."

"...From whom?" The Cassian that Trahearne met had no shotgun and was working himself up something terrible over Tannusen's face. It wasn't easy to assume that the priest would be the one wielding the firearm.

"The catholic. You only met the meek half."

Tannusen slumped further into the blanket he'd bundled himself up in.

"I see." He thought Cassian was too open for Tannusen to get so attached to. That explained a lot. He didn't want to know what kind of unholy terror the other have could've been.

"Well that half was exceptionally worried about you, ran right into that mark on the door in his hurry to try to find you." Tannusen didn't know exactly what Trahearne's wells did, but "nothing good" was safely assumed.

"Yeah, well, that half's learned better by now," Tannusen muttered down into the blanket, barely audible from where Trahearne stood. "I tried to hurt him."

With that emphasis, and the way he went just a bit paler... no, he didn't mean a simple attack.

He felt ill. Well and truly ill.

Trahearne was silent awhile. There was a lot he wanted to say to that, a lot that may or may not help. In the end, he didn't feel like much of it was worth the risk while Tannusen was like this. He walked over and sat on the futon, far enough away from Tannu that the fae shouldn't have to pull away.

"I don't think," he said slowly, carefully, "That you should assume he will blame you, given the circumstances."

There was bile in the back of his throat, and Tannusen refused to look over at the sylvari.

"I don't care." Well, he did care, but, the human's potential opinion on the matter wasn't the only one in play, here. Tannusen still had to live with knowing what he'd tried to do.

The 'bad' half, sure, but now that he was all smushed back together again, what difference did that make?

Not a damn bit.

It made all the difference and Trahearne had a good idea what was going through Tannusen's mind on the matter.

"What we choose to do says a great deal more about our character than what we're capable of." In either direction, good or bad. "Given you were deprived of choice- well, I think you should give yourself time and understanding."

"And what about what's lurking just under that choice?" Tannusen shuddered. "I'm turning into Trench."

A name he'd never mentioned around Trahearne, before. But his tone and the context spoke volumes; this was not a good thing. Not a good thing at all. His expression, stricken, was hidden in the blanket.

"I'm one big nature versus nurture experiment gone wrong. I don't expect you to get it."

Sylvari weren't really... raised, after all, were they?

Trahearne looked over to him, a look of deep sadness flashing across his face for a moment before it was gone, lost in the calm he tried to maintain. He looked down at his hands in his lap.

"No, you can't expect me to understand," he said softly. "I can't expect to understand either. What I do understand is, as you are now, whole, you would not make that choice. Given choice, you would not act on horrible thoughts."

He rubbed at the palm of his hand with the thumb of the other, pushing hard to feel the pressure through the leafy glove.

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