tampered | some very serious sandwiches

some very serious sandwiches

When; Tonight (10/9)
Rating; None, check here for warnings.
Characters; Lin (

notapreacher)
Summary; Lin owes Gren dinner. Or something.
Log; Lin is punctual, of course. It only took a little network message, grim, to find out if he was home, and then he made his way to Gren's apartment at the appointed time. So there he is, standing at the door and wondering if maybe he ought to just cut his losses and run. Still, Lin is nothing if not a slave to what he feels he owes, and he put Gren out of a meal and a bottle of bourbon on a curse day that feels like a lifetime ago. So he's back with bag in arms to replace those things.

No reason to be nervous. Why the hell should he be? Lin knocks on the door, twice, precisely.

Lin is as he always is, dressed in a trenchcoat and a tie. Not the least bit relaxed. Body language solid, inexpressive, belying an occasional moment of awkwardness. He stands as if making delivery, completing a business transaction. Perhaps that's all he knows how to do.

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There are some things that are definitely worth doing without question. Lately he's had his share of those and to say life's gotten a lot more complicated in the past month or so is a giant understatement. But by another token it's gotten simpler: one very big threat to his safety -- he thinks -- is gone.

So why is it that he's reverting to old habits from his days on Callisto and thinking of Vicious with a lot more fondness than he has since he arrived at this place? He doesn't know and now isn't the moment to figure it out. It's just that Lin has to be going through something about that too, and maybe they'll talk about it and maybe they won't.

At the knock on the door he straightens up, puts his book aside. Everything he needs for work later is ready and set aside in preparation: Lin's message was a surprise.

"Come on in." It's better that Lin used the door this time instead of just showing up in his bed with handcuffs. If timing had been different, that could have been a problem. Actually, it was a problem anyway, but it's over and done with and all things considered, that wasn't the worst curse he's seen here.

Not so far.

The silence is awkward and he's used to filling those empty spaces when he's at work, but this is his home and he's not really sure why Lin's here, but he's glad for it. He did make him the offer, both that day and other days. Whether or not Lin ever took him up on it was never in his control.

In the living room, the windows are screenless and wide open; a warm breeze rustles the curtains.

It's pleasant indoors, and the overall feeling of the place is so much less suppressive than his first visit here. Lin nods and enters without saying more, wandering to set his bag of provisions on the kitchen counter.

"You fixed me a meal when I was stuck here, and I drank a lot of your bourbon. I owe you for that." Lin pulled out the bottle - a good brand, not inexpensive, setting it down with the gentle thud of glass. "I also made you some sandwiches. They're not bad, I don't think."

Truthfully chicken salad was all that he'd been able to manage without blowing up his kitchen. Simple ingredients and instructions.

He has his back to Gren which is something he shouldn't do, but the sky through the windows is so blue and the breeze so gentle today. He embraces the danger.

"Thanks."

It's actually a really sweet gesture and while he doesn't think Lin owes him a single thing -- he is responsible for his death, after all -- it seems like a step in the right direction. If the conversation they had at Lux the night Vicious disappeared is any indication, Lin's got a lot to sort through.

They both do, and while he's not a preacher he's a fine listener.

"You're going to stay and have dinner with me, aren't you?"

Lin turns to glance at him. "Oh. I guess I could. If you wanted. Sure."

No angry resistance. He's not even taken aback at Gren's offer anymore. He's not sure he understands it, but at least it no longer has the power to startle him.

"Plates? I can set the sandwiches out."

No time like the present: the kitchen's not that big and the plates are out in a minute. It's easier doing this when they're not handcuffed together, that's for sure, and there's an almost companionable silence in the room right now.

Almost as an afterthought he sets out two small glasses and two water glasses: he usually doesn't drink alcohol on nights he works, but he can make an exception considering there's food to go with it... if their bodies metabolize things the same way as they did when they were alive. It seems to work, and maybe it's the thought that counts: he doesn't know. Some days he thinks he doesn't know anything. He nods to Lin to sit and make himself comfortable, sets the pot on the stove to boil for tea. There's no such thing as too many choices, right?

"What have you been doing with yourself?"

It's almost a fair question. A little on the invasive side, but Lin can always choose not to answer.

Lin sits but doesn't make himself comfortable - honestly, does he even know how to be comfortable? His posture is perfect. His shirt and tie perfectly ironed. The picture is so complete, it seems almost a shame that he speaks.

"Nothing much." Nothing at all, really. The numbness is a little overwhelming, but it's better than thinking. Every moment in this City, Lin has been biding his time for his moment, not knowing what it would look like when he saw it. The ticking seems so much louder now.

"You?"

Sleeping with a vampire probably isn't the right thing to say just now, even though it's true. There are some things Lin doesn't need to know. There are some things nobody gets to hear about, so he doesn't say them. He's an old pro at keeping secrets anyway.

"The usual. Working, wandering around, listening to what's going on out there more than being loud. Missing Faye. Missing Vicious. Watching people come and go. Waiting. Wondering who's next. Wondering where people actually go when they leave. What happens to those who are dead."

That about sums it up, with the exception of the whole falling in love bit. And he keeps that quiet on the network. People find out anyway and there isn't much he can do about it, but that's the way things go.

"Avoiding the ticking of the clock whenever I can." He's getting more used to having company here; he doesn't even think about the clock on nights when Lestat's here.

That's a blessing from his favorite self-titled Dark Creature.

Lin listens and takes it in. Gren survived in Blue Crow, maybe the isolated feeling of the City isn't as bad for him. Whatever the case, he didn't have his identity wrapped up in anything but himself, so living in general just had to be so much easier. As he listens to the words, his mind wanders through the contours and shapes of each vowel and phrase. He stares at Gren's hair. It takes a moment for him to realize Gren's done talking.

Lin nods slightly, and pours them both shots. He drinks his before going on. "You miss Vicious. Why?"

That's a complicated question and it has an equally complicated answer. It's also not unexpected.

"I've been wondering that myself. I think... I think it's because he's a part of me and a part of my story, and because I used to love him." Not the same way Lin did or does, of course, and not the same way he loves Lestat now. "And because... he was familiar and a presence and even though he was pretty horrible to me here, he told me something one of the last times we talked that I never expected to hear. I would have liked to know more about it. But I don't miss the way he used to follow me, or the threats he made, or knowing that no matter what any of us did, he was watching and keeping track of everything."

That about covers it; he takes a sip of the bourbon, feeling the burn all the way down his throat. "Kind of crazy, isn't it? Considering I tried my hardest to kill him just before I got here. Then again, I don't remember saying I'm sane."

Sanity isn't a claim he's made for himself since before he went to prison.

"I see." And Lin is content to let the conversation slip into silence as he nibbles one of his sandwiches. He's thinking, for a long time. "I suppose, after sometime you become accustomed to someone, no matter what their position in your life was." He's beginning to suspect that Gren is such a person. That's a little bit sickening.

"I spent a lot of time with him. Perhaps I could lend an insight."

Not that they ever talked about Vicious's past, of course, but Lin's obsession with him was complete enough that he remembered what crumbs and details he did learn.

"These sandwiches are pretty good."

He's not so sure he's interested in Lin's insights. As much as he says he misses Vicious, he's equally relieved he's gone. Maybe he ought to tell Lin that too... not that it matters to anyone but him.

"And I suppose that after a period of time some people get used to things and people no matter how bad or toxic they are. It isn't that I liked the way he was here. I don't miss him for some sick reason or other; I'm not a masochist. But he was a tie to the world out there and I guess his presence here made that more real. I don't know." Lin can see for himself that Vicious's picture is still on his living room wall. He's thought about taking it down for good a thousand times, but he hasn't done it yet.

It might happen. But even if it does, he can't deny his past. He can't go back and rewrite history.

The water boils on the stove and the kettle lets out an insistent hissing whistle; he moves over to tend to that and speaks back to Lin. "But if it'll make you feel better to try to lend an insight, I'll listen."

"It's nothing impressive. As long as I follow the recipe, I'm fine." Lin is aware of the irony, if only a little, and it very nearly makes him laugh. He's so good with instructions. Now there's no one here to tell him what to do. How terrifying.

"Make me feel better? How am I supposed to feel better?" Genuinely troubled by the question, Lin's brow knits. What Gren said before may have been meant to needle him, but Lin hardly understood. Only in the vaguest ways could he make the connection to Gren and Havoc's rampant humanity, only in the corner of his eye could he observe that he'd transformed into a shadow of a human being, twisted and manipulated of his own volition. Toxic, was the word Gren used. As if Lin were poisoned.

"I wondered what you could be to him, that he was so excited to see you. He doesn't let things show much... didn't." Fuck, he's dead, isn't he? Lin pauses.

"I want to tell you he didn't betray you. I don't have proof. If he had something to gain from it, maybe he would. I didn't feel it, though. There was some kind of... happiness, he felt, about getting to see you again. He was disappointed to hear you wouldn't show. I could feel it. Maybe because you knew him on Titan, I don't know."

He's dead, he's dead, he's dead.

Lin covers his mouth and sits back, remembering something bitter.

"If he really did betray you, he would have suspected you might want to have it out with him. I'm sure. He would have told me to be prepared for the possibility."

"That's what he told me. That he didn't testify. And when I asked him anything else about it he told me I didn't have the right to ask and that was that."

Methodically, the water goes into the teapot to steep and he's not even sure why. He doesn't even want tea, or bourbon, or water or sandwiches. He doesn't want to be sitting here talking about Vicious like he just stepped away for a cigarette break. None of this makes sense, and he hates this part of things at the City.

"But he didn't act happy to see me on Callisto and he didn't act happy to see me here. He was playing a game with me. Wouldn't talk unless I asked the right questions, used the right buzzwords. I don't know. It wasn't a very good way of setting the record straight if he wasn't the one responsible for me going to prison."

Honestly, he doesn't know what to believe. And now he'll never really know: Lin has suspicions but no proof, but Lin also has unresolved feelings for Vicious. He knows that.

"So if he was excited to see me, he had a funny way of showing it. Maybe he should have just talked to me. Then things might have been fine; I don't know." The truth of the matter is that they've all made mistakes. And apparently death doesn't cure stupidity, because they're still making mistakes. That same feeling of restless hopelessness he had the day he and Lin were handcuffed together is coming back and he doesn't like it one bit.

"Maybe he should have." And maybe he should have talked to Spike, too, and Miss Julia. "That wasn't his way. You know that about him."

Lin is quiet again. He watches the steam rise from the teapot. He wonders what he's doing here, and what he hopes to achieve, and realizes he has no way to answer that question. He had a free moment, the ticking was getting to him, and now he's here.

"It's not like he's the type to show affection. Or anything at all." Except for the occasional bouts of malice and sadism, Vicious was all about control. "Forgive me. I am not really qualified to speak for him. When I served him, I thought I knew him well, but it was different here, and I cannot speak for his motivations."

Lin is so subservient.

"You're more qualified to speak for him than anyone else, Lin. And you're right: he wasn't the type to show affection, or much of anything. I don't know. I knew him for a little bit a long time ago and thought... well, it doesn't matter what I thought. It's all in the past."

He wants to ask Lin to tell him something else -- anything else -- but he's got the feeling that would send him into some spiral of despair: Lin's like a boat without a rudder now that Vicious is gone.

There won't be any more apologizing for killing him, that's for sure: he's done with that kind of thing.

"I think it's time for me to move on." Whether or not Lin chooses to let go of the past is his own business.

"No I'm not. I was wrong on several key points."

Without thinking, Lin pours the tea. A rude thing to do while at someone else's house, but he's always the one who poured the tea, and he finds himself doing it now, too. For some kind of distraction. For anything else todo.

"How do you it? Move on."

The tea's actually a welcome distraction; he picks up his cup, warms his hands on it. How does he move on?

"I don't know, Lin. By just doing and being." It's what he did for his three years on Callisto. "When you think you can't do it any more, you just keep going anyway. When you think there's no way you can get past whatever's bothering you, you just do. Remember the parts that were good and just let go of the ones that weren't. They can't really touch you any more, anyway."

At least that's what he guesses; he really doesn't know. There are some situations that always seem impossible.

"It doesn't mean you don't think about it. It doesn't mean you don't respect all the things you used to respect. It just means you don't let the past run your life any more. Look for new things, or old comfortable things that you can use in new ways."

Lin leans forward slightly, thumb and forefinger to his temples, covering his eyes. "I have lived like that, and it still touched me. Get away on a space ship, it still does. Like nameless shadows haunting me. I got close to the brightest thing I saw just so I wouldn't look. Now I'm where I started."

He's not even aware he's talking so much, seems to realize it when he moves his hand from his face and shuts up right quick. Now who's sounding like he thinks he's the only person whom something bad has happened to? Lin blows on his tea absently. "There's no need for a syndicate here. Not like there was on Tharsis. To form one would only be a bid for power, and one that couldn't last long because you could never count on your members, with disappearances and all. So I remain a rather irrelevant person here."

"Is that's what's bothering you?" The look he gives Lin is sharp though not unkind. He'd like to laugh but he's too polite for that. "We're all irrelevant people here. Do you think the deities give a rat's ass about any one of us? They're just playing with us."

Bringing people here, sending them away, putting curses on them. Like dolls, dressed up and discarded when they get too boring.

"And you're anywhere but back where you started. None of us can go back to the beginning. This place might give us a second chance, but it doesn't give us a free pass. We have to make our own opportunities."

Sometimes things are handed to people and sometimes they have to scramble and claw their way to get what they want, but they have to make it happen in either case, either by being in the right place at the right time or working really hard for it.

"Just because no one's here to tell you what to do doesn't mean you don't know what needs to be done."

Lin makes the slightest bit of a grimace, listening to him. His first impulse is to raise his voice, to ask Gren what the fuck he knows, but he fights it. He came here to... to... make peace or something. To acknowledge one of the few people left from their world. Does that bond count for something?

Does anything ever count for anything?

Lin sits back and drinks his tea, deep in thought for several moments. "I'm nothing without the syndicate. Hell, I was nothing the moment I lost Vicious's favor. This place is a dead end to me. Why won't it let me go?"

He stares out the window at the sky.

"I don't know." Softly, he shakes his head: the tea is good and strong and exactly what's called for. The question Lin asks is something he's thought about over and over in his time here, although when he thinks it he phrases it differently: what is the point in being here?

"I wish I did. I wish someone did. I like to think there's a point to this place. I mean, we're dead, both of us. We're not supposed to be wandering around as clueless as we were when we were alive." He can't help but laugh at that one. "I really don't know. Maybe we're supposed to learn something. Maybe we're here to apologize. Maybe we're here not to apologize. Maybe this is a pit stop on the way to some sort of judgment, if you believe in that sort of thing. Or maybe we're here to get to have the experiences we didn't out there. Enjoy things a little, for once."

He really doesn't know, but it all strikes him as being completely absurd at the moment. So absurd that he laughs again.

Hard.

He had to die to find love.

"I don't believe in that sort of thing."

Lin drinks his tea.

"Maybe we're here to discover our true selves. I've often thought that we could exist here like memories, or computer programs... or souls. Something apart from what we were in our world, despite appearances. I can't neglect the possibility that we've transcended, regardless of how unlikely it seems."

He thinks of Callisto, and idly wonders if Vicious brought home a body. Probably not. He was done, finished, as useless as scattered casing.

"You say, enjoy yourself, you know what you want. These impulses seem to occur to you as natural thoughts. I think I may be envious of that."

Personally, he thinks Lin's full of shit saying he doesn't believe in that kind of thing but he'll be a nice host and keep his opinion to himself. Lin's so guarded, hiding so efficiently behind his tea and the now-forgotten sandwiches.

"Envious?" That's a little crazy: can someone actually be jealous of another man's thought processes? "Look, I've always been a pretty emotional person. Acting on that is the first thing that occurs to me."

Emotional responses lead to one of two places: satisfaction or regret. If he hadn't been quite so emotional he wouldn't have lost control the way he did in prison, and if that hadn't happened they wouldn't have dragged him to the hospital wing and pumped him full of addictive drugs. One thing always leads to another: if neither of those things had happened he might not have done the most stupid thing of his life -- trying to get answers from Vicious -- and if he hadn't done that he wouldn't have killed Lin and died in turn at Vicious's hands.

It's such a tangled web.

"Borrow some of my excess emotional response if you want: I've got plenty to spare." Really, he ought to give it a try. Beneath the self-imposed straitjacket of decorum he's wearing, Lin's not a bad guy. He just needs to learn how to smile.

"Is it possible to do that? Maybe I could do a trial run of emotions and see how it works."

Lin raises an eyebrow. As close to an indication of humor as one might get, if one doesn't smile.

"The fallout of that might be a bit much. I got emotional, once, when I came to the City, and the result was embarrassing. I would hate for it to happen again."

Even if Vicious wasn't here, he would still feel humiliated.

But more than that it's the weight of it. Of course he really does have emotions, and they're locked up on a steel box that sits on his lungs. If the door so much as jiggles, it gets heavier, threatens to crush them.

The thought of ever seeing the world through anything but one intensely focused lens in almost nauseating. Could he see all the colors if he opened that box? Would it be Pandora's, with Hope at the bottom, or Urashima Taro's, with nothing but the wasted years flying back in his face?

Oh, Lin. He has a surge not of sympathy but of empathy and those are two very different things. The first carries a measure of pathos and regret but the second simply carries understanding with it. He hasn't ever been where Lin is, emotionally speaking, but he's been close. The drugs they "tested" on him left him so incapable of expressing emotion that he was much closer to dead then than he is now.

"Once? What happened? I don't mean to embarrass you all over again, but I'm trying to understand." That's something else emotionally-based people do: they want answers. They want to know. They have this yearning to get to the bottom of things and figure them out and that's why he set up the whole red-eye thing on Callisto.

He needed to know.

Here and now, he reaches for that bottle and tops off Lin's glass.

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some very serious sandwiches

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