tampered | Log: Ended.

Log: Ended.

When; Afternoon of September 30.
Rating; PG to PG-13 to be safe.
Characters; Nagarov

beast_unbound and Anita Blake

browning_baby
Summary; Nagarov and Anita meet up in a little coffee shop, each for their own reasons.
Log;

As he leaned forward in his chair, reaching out to toy with a packet of sugar on the table, he glanced up at the door to see if she was coming. Sure, he had come early, but he liked to do that. It made people happier, and friendlier, if he wasn't late. Long ago, he wouldn't have given it much thought, but then again, he wasn't what he used to be, or who he used to be. Fusion cannons tended to disable one's power and influence, especially when they destroyed your main vessel with most of your body inside it.

So, here he was, formed as a human and pondering the wild ways of women. He had generally avoided dating, because that meant he was so close that he would be identified with the victim when they conveniently vanished. He just learned the lure tactics that softened them, so that they would tell him about their friends, and their friends would tell him about their friends, and then when one friend four steps down the line didn't come home, and another three steps in a different angle, and another...well, they were a little disconnected by the time he was done. It was like money laundering, only worse.

He tore the corner of the sugar packet and rubbed it between his fingers. Tough paper. Unbleached. Sucrose was good enough for him, though there were better compounds. The cells in his fingers pulled it into his hand, tearing down the fiber and sugar alike.

Back to Anita. Pretty woman, by human standards. She seemed to appreciate the classic kind soul, someone who was honest, genuinely nice, and had an innocent look. There were some humans who didn't; some liked pain, some liked harshness, and some liked plain evil. But she didn't like those. He had done his best to be kind, to avoid touchy questions save for the surface, to seem like a somewhat naive man who simply thought she was a little pretty and wanted to be friends with her.

A human came up and asked him if he wanted anything, and he continued to think while he looked attentive, propped his chin on a red-gloved hand, and spoke a few appropriate words about ordering coffee.

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It didn't take her much longer to arrive. She looked a little tired and her eyes bore that soft red that spoke of tears that had recently been wiped away. Still, when she saw him, she offered him a smile and joined him just in time to order the biggest cup of coffee the place had.

"Sorry I'm late. Had stuff to deal with. You know... "

Her eyes were red and weary, meaning that something wasn't quite standard with her. He returned the smile with a concerned one, draw up the brows a little, move his coffee to one side to open the area between them.

"I understand." He reached for the tiny cream pitcher -- better, because fats had more energy than sugars -- and poured a second's trickle into his cup, never taking his eyes off her face for more than few seconds. "I'd have taken a rain check if it was something serious. You don't look like yourself." He settled into a lean again, cup in one hand, the other gently resting against his chin.

She takes the cup with a nod of gratitude and a few murmured words then immediately takes a long drink. No sipping this time.

"I'm just tired right now. Haven't been sleeping as much as I should be. Stupid, since I've been off for a couple days. I guess having time off just doesn't mean the same as having time."

There's a soft, wry smile breaking the pale line of her face.

"How've you been, besides, busy with the shop?"

"All I talk about, isn't it?" He closes his eyes, looks a little sheepish, opens them again and points their deep blue gaze into hers again. The color is very saturated for a human's, yes, but he planned it that way. "Well, aside from a couple of commissions, I'm off to City Solutions with Tony Stark. Keeps me busy. I like my life busy."

Chuckling for a moment, he lifts the cup and shakes it once to swirl the cream. "Time off from the force? When I don't have any work, I don't know what to do with myself. I hear people take up hobbies. Maybe you should knit." He brings the coffee to his lips, his eyes smiling at her over it, and he waits a few seconds before taking a generous drink himself. Imitate the person in the conversation, lighten them up. If you get people talking, they don't stop. She's got something on her mind, it's in the smile, you can see it in the lips. Heh, he'd be a poet if he were human and felt what they did, maybe. Or just a psychiatrist.

The voices are always there, and now they seem to hiss at him, Because you have us, although he knows they're never in unison.

The thought of her knitting brought a trace of a real smile to her lips, even if it was hidden behind the cup.

"So do I. Keeping me busy keeps me from brooding or being pissed off about random things. Usually. I just took a couple days off to see if I could spend some quiet time at home. It's been a while since I did that wasn't involving bed rest for some reason."

Her eyes crinkle barely a little -- good. "I bet they missed you on the force, the way you go at your work." His voice has a soft accent, something smooth that his name suggests. "What disturbed your time off?"

There, bring up the police, ask what's going on, get her to throw him a line. He's mostly in thought, although he can tell his face to do whatever he wants, and he makes it move appropriately to keep watching, look interested enough, casual, all that he needs to. The cells shift like muscles, pulling appropriately, but inside they're nothing like a real face. He's not wearing a mask; he is a mask, if only because at his core he is nothing.

"I'm betting differently. They took Ophelia in and I wasn't allowed to join the party that did it. I was stuck on patrol."

Yes, it irritated her that she hadn't been able to be there to see her killer brought in. Yes, it was still fresh on her mind. Anita holds grudges, after all.

A negligent hand gestured to the side as if to dismiss her grumpiness over the slight.

"Personal stuff, really. Relationship crap. Nothing more."

What a loaded way to say it. New love, old love and replacements.

He looks rueful at her first statement, remaining silent as she continues with a quick and broad ending. But it's filled with information and potential. Sandra did something like this once, and he can still hear her, and she's screaming something in a language no one in this City would know, and she tells Anita to run, person, whoever you are, I know something's going on. He ignores the voice and rests his hand on the mug's handle.

"I'm sorry, although I wasn't involved..." He raises his eyes to hers, this time doesn't bother dallying, stares into them, reaches deep. Part of his mind imagines what may be behind it, a step towards the end; a path to the force, to knowledge; a person who leads to a person who leads to her.

His voice softens, so that no one nearby -- there are few, if any, but still -- can hear. "Lestat?"

She glances up in time to see his eyes catch hers and the pull they have is almost odd to her. Findig herself staring back, she sighs softly and sets the cup down, fingers tracing the handle.

"Yeah. Him and Cloud both. One of them pulls away from me and the other gravitates ever closer. Being in love with more than one person is fucking hard sometimes, especially when one of them is busy and in love with someone else, too."

He nods and releases the mug, hand near it in a similar pose but still. "You still want him with you, but he wants someone else and not you as well?"

Fingers still moving, she looks away from his eyes. The mug might be safe to stare at right now.

"I have no idea what he wants here lately, other than not me. He says he does, but we rarely see each other much anymore, except in passing. I think he's too busy with Gren to even notice it's bothering me."

Her face twists into a slightly disgusted grimace.

"The human heart if a screwed up organ, lemme tell you."

"I've learned over time that I can't just wish away people's pain, or I would try." He reaches out to one of her arms and lays his hand on it lightly for a moment, long enough to let her know it's there, long enough to draw her mind back to him, but not so long that it borders on the strange. He isn't staring at her now, but going back to his own coffee, taking a sip, replacing it as he places the words within the casual motion. "Do you want to care like this?"

That gets her attention. Her gaze flickers to rest on his hand for a moment, then up to his face.

"... I love a lot of people in my life. Sometimes... I think it'd be easier if I didn't. Less pain and worry, but I can't just turn it off like a switch."

His mind is smiling, but the signal isn't reaching his eyes; they still look calm, are moving up to her again.

"The human heart may have its problems, but the human brain has its advantages." His voice is a little different now; while it's still soft and calm, he's not quite speaking how he was. He sounds a bit more knowing, less casual-young-man. Older. "The switch can be flipped."

This time, her eyes narrow a little, but it isn't in irritation or suspicion. More like unwitting curiousity.

"... what do you mean?"

He knows to approach this carefully, because the last time he brought up something even remotely out of the ordinary with someone in the City, that had been it. This wasn't remotely out of the ordinary, this was entirely out of the ordinary.

"I'm working on nanites for Tony Stark." He motions to her with his open hand. There, it shifts the topic from my-sketchy-project to something official. "Back in my world, nanites can do a lot of things, including changing the brain, within reason." That is true if you count his work as nanites. "If you need the switch flipped, it's possible. It has been done many times in my world, for many reasons. It would make you different, and it wouldn't be trivial, but it's possible. If you don't want to do this anymore, have to dull the pain, keep it in mind. It's the best I can offer you."

There. He did what he could. Suggested it under a softer context, gave it as a clear choice, just a last-ditch effort, but hopefully kept it tempting. At worst, she would think him a complete freak and avoid him. But it was a chance he had to take.

Without a word, she leans back in her chair and stares at him. For several long moments, she's still and obviously deep in thought. Finally the silence is broken with a short sigh.

"... how would it make me different?"

"It would change part of your personality, but that comes with the territory." His lips press together, and he traces a finger along the table demonstratively as he explains. "Emotions are complex things, though that's obvious to you at this point. In a nutshell, there's a main path in the brain that they follow, and specific regions involved in different emotions. A calculated change can decrease the magnitude of certain emotions. What you would experience, would be a decline in sadness and fear. Happiness uses, fortunately, a different part of the pathway than the nanites would touch."

Sometimes the truth is the best option, especially when it's not the whole truth. He sits back, letting his hand trail across the table and to the coffee. Ceramic is smooth and foreign to his fingers, and he runs his thumb along the handle as he waits for the next challenge. This is good practice, at the very least. Oh, how far he has fallen, but he has no time to lament it. Honor and dignity are illusions. Efficiency, skill, and persistence are what counts.

Her lips purse as she falls into a few moments of thought. The thing that shocks her the most is that she's actually thinking about how much she'd like to lose that nagging sadness she's been feeling for days now; ever since she found out the arguement.

"Well, some might think changing my personality would be a good thing. I'll... think about it."

She motions for more coffee with an absent hand, attention still turned a little inward.

"Take your time. I don't mean to depress you." He presses a hand to his forehead as if reprimanding himself, glances at her from beneath it, and hands her the tiny cream pitcher with the other hand. "You're going to be twitching all day if you drink it that black. Anyway, on to rosier matters. Who's this Smudge I keep hearing about?"

The topic had been done, and so he wouldn't push it. Now, on to other information, put in a transition. In a way, he wanted an animal, just for personal curiosity and study and to attract more visitors to the warehouse. But it would get her mind free to think about other things.

"I'm already depressed. Can't go much lower."

Another wry smile for him before she takes the pitcher from him. A few drips of creme this time, plus a pretty liberal dosage of sugar go into the cup this time.

"First cup is always black. The rest can get prettied up. Just the way I do things. Smudge is a kitten I found and was adopted by. We have a lot of animals at the apartment, actually. They're fun to have around. Smudge seems to think my shower is a good bed and gets pissy when someone moves her to get clean."

"Yeah, I thought of getting some kind of pet. Not sure, really. Dogs are a lot of work; maybe I'll get a cat." He drains the rest of his cup and holds it at a cavalier angle as he rests his elbow on the table. "Is patrol very exciting these days? I know you're bummed about being stuck there...I've heard a lot of distant complaining about some Warden and how he's doing stuff."

"I'm shocked it's just distant. Charming's changed a lot of things and there's not a lot of love for it. There's been a lot of stuff going on, but thankfully none of it involves anything real serious."

The second cup is finished in record time, showing just how antsy she really is.

"Well, I look at a whole lot of Network every day, and people tend to hide away their complaining." He picks up the small pitcher and pauses halfway to his cup, wondering just how quirky drinking straight cream is to her, then chuckles and pours a bit in. Waving for more coffee, he sips the cream as if nothing is odd at all. "With all the stuff going down, it's a wonder you're not stretched too thin. How many people do you guys have?"

Charming (presumably Prince) = Warden. Filed away.

"We're a little thin, but right now, that's not too bad since there's nothing really going on. When we're busy, though? It's a nightmare, like when we were working the last serial killer case. Nobody had a lot of rest then and we just had to keep going. Right now, we're at maybe half what a city this size should have."

The creme being drank isn't all that odd, considering someone back home didn't like sugar in their coffee. No, they had to have caramel instead.

Weirdos.

They're understaffed. Good to know. If he ever decided to, he could lead them on a trail like they've never seen before. But that's only if necessary.

"Who was it, in the end, if I may ask? Or is that proprietary?" Just as he shook out the last drop, a hand came by with the pitcher to pour another cup. Good timing. A distraction of some kind would keep them away. Shapeshifters could do a lot of things, especially one like him.

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Log: Ended.

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