psychoshenanigans | GRATIA // PSL

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GRATIA // PSL

So, here's what Irahl knows.

He's alone in a dark, cold cave. He has most, if not all, of his gear. No one is guarding his location. As he heads away from the spot where he came to consciousness, no one tries to stop him, and no one gets in his way. The few people he finds down there seem human, and not about to approach the nearly-seven-foot man that comes stalking out of the lower tunnels. Honestly, everyone here seems a surprised and a little astonished about his... Entire scene.

There is a way up. It's a maze of twisting corridors and confusing passageways, half of which feel too small for him. It's bigger and bigger groups of people, some of which scatter like schools of fish, and some of which have to be pushed through to get anywhere. It's climbing up into streets lit with dingy lights, graffiti-covered hallways, warehouses, weird holes in stone walls that may or may not be windows. It's alarm bells, it's people yelling at each other down the street. It's just an absurd number of stairs. A couple of people make an attempt to stop him somewhere, and it goes poorly for them.

Elsewhere, events are being set in motion where Irahl cannot see. But he's on his way out.

Eventually, more people try to stop him. At the end of another long stretch of Underground city, a group of official-looking folks are putting a real effort into blocking off the obvious exit, and some of them have weapons.

Down a side alley, into another tunnel, and then the space opens up into a... Plaza, of some sort? The floor is made of stone. The buildings surrounding it are made of stone and are hard to distinguish from one another. At at least the ceiling (also made of stone) is a lot higher than before. Cavernous. There's some kind of sculpture in the middle of it, some impressive feat of geometric stonework that gives the illusion of defying gravity despite weighing literal tons.

This is where someone finally catches him. Sounds have been echoing unhelpfully down every passageway, making it hard to tell if people are coming or going - but this series of quick footsteps comes from an upward direction before someone hits the ground about five feet in front of Irahl.

His clothes are different. His hair is better-kept. Maybe if the situation wasn't quite so tense, there'd be time to see the ways in which his face is different, the way his eyes don't have quite as vicious and sharp a gleam as they used to. But whatever Irahl can take in of him, there is Robin, having hopped down from a rooftop to put himself between him and the exit again.

"...Holy shit."

Kind of weird that he looks absolutely shocked to see the person in front of him, though.

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There will undoubtedly be some other time when the two of them can argue drunkenly about whether or not 'squiggling' or 'strategic maneuver' is a better descriptor. That time may even be later that very evening--but for now, Vincent takes the bait and is more than happy to go back to insisting he could definitely rip Irahl's entire arm out of his socket.

Finn's warnings (because Vincent's descriptions are getting a little too specific to pass for overexaggerated jokes) will continue and will be an ongoing theme for the rest of the climb, as the three monsters slowly make their way up the spiraling ramp towards whatever half of the city gets to kick the other half out at night. As they walk, they sometimes pass large, glass windows set into the interior wall of the path. Through those, Finn can watch the elevator they would have taken pass them, up and down, dozens of times.

He's pretty salty about it at first, but by the time they finally hit the 'open' streets and leave the elevator behind, he's more... Well, this wasn't the evening he'd expected, but it's been a long time since he's interacted with other men outside of the context of his new employment. Even if they're drunk and stressful to be around, it's felt kind of normal. He doesn't get a lot of normal these days, so he's strangely thankful.

That's what's going through his head as he finally stops the three of them. They've just emerged out of another stairwell, with the path opening up onto another mall-like interior. Unlike the passages underground, however, the glass roof of this platform has a clear view of the night sky above them, only broken by hints of larger towers crowding out edges of the view here and there. We've also returned to the shameless overabundance of plants everywhere.

The area seems pretty busy. Plenty of folks are either heading determinedly in one way or the other, or chatting with friends in the way one does when they're leaving a party--saying they'll talk again soon, getting distracted with a quick story before they go, that kind of thing.

"Okay guys, this is it," Finn announces, and points, "You still have to go up that street for quite a ways before you'll be in the neighborhood of your hotel, but you won't get locked out as long as you don't walk down any stairs or downhill. Got it?"

He looks at Irahl, who is... Unfortunately the one who can see where he's pointing.

A side effect of living a very long life where very little ever changes is that when things do change quite a bit, it can sometimes get hard to remember the correct place and time that things are happening in, especially when complications like alcohol are thrown into the mix.

So, as Irahl autopilots forward, he unwittingly kind of loses track of things like whether these big halls are inside of a city or in a town-sized ship in space, and if he's strolling along with old colleagues or new ones. It all feels comfortably familiar.

It isn't until he surfaces out of his buzz to find himself surprised by the sight of a gleaming, vertical city that he remembers all of the context of when and why he is.

This is why there is a small delay before his attention is properly following where Finn is pointing, and another lag before he nods.

Yep, he's caught up again now. He's totally got this.

"Oh, yeah," Vincent responds, not entirely clear that the question was mostly for Irahl, "I got it."

Finn continues to look at Irahl for a moment. It wouldn't be a proper conclusion to their long and arduous hike up a shallow incline if they just wrapped this up cleanly and efficiently, would it? He sighs for the hundredth time this evening, but it's through a small smirk.

"Irahl, which direction did I just say not to go?"

He just needs to make sure Irahl actually got it.

"Hnh?"

Somewhere, Jandru must be feeling inexplicably proud of Finn in that moment, and probably relieved that someone other than themself is catching on to some more of their new sniper's traits. Irahl looks back down at Finn for a moment of incomprehension, manually paging back through his recent memory to figure out what Finn is talking about before it can be dumped into the garbage can of his mind.

It only takes a couple of seconds, but those are seconds that shouldn't have been needed, before he's truly got it.

"Down."

Jandru may be the cleverest out of the bunch, but Finn's had enough experience with drugged patients and drunk coworkers to know better than to just assume Irahl has heard him. Honestly, even if all he was pulling from was today, he'd still probably double-check.

"You got it," Finn confirms, happy to have been proven wrong in the end, "Don't go down."

"Don't go down, right..." Vincent also mutters to himself, since he heard just about as much as Irahl did the first time.

"Other than that, you're free to go. Thanks for letting me walk you home, boys."

"Hey, no, thank you," Vincent says, turning to where he approximates Finn is and managing to pat the guy on his shoulder on the second try (which is startling for Finn), "You didn't have'ta do any of this, 'preciate the time."

"...No problem," Finn says, clearly glancing at the gigantic meaty hand on his shoulder and wondering how long it is going to stay there.

"An' I wanted to say, you aughta come over sometime before we leave, I wanted to ask you about some stuff. You know..."

Finn lifts the giant man's hand off of his shoulder at that point, taking a firm stance on how far he wants that sentence to go, "--Yes, I know. Sure. I... I'll figure something out with Jandru."

"That'd be great," Vincent grins, letting his arm drop the moment Finn lets go of it.

"And, um, for you--" Finn escapes this goodbye with Vincent by speaking to Irahl again, "I guess I'll be seeing you at work?"

By the time that Finn has freed himself and turned back to Irahl, it's pretty clear that the sniper has a good smirk of amusement hiding behind his scarf. Even drunk, he is well aware of Vincent's penchant for fervent friendship when the mood strikes him, and he finds this fact just as endearing as he finds it very funny that someone other than himself is receiving the brunt of it.

He can only imagine that it's even more awkward for someone who is accustomed to that face normally belonging to Seth. It's hilarious.

"Guess so. See you around the watercooler."

Something about the delivery of that joke, here and now, gets Finn to laugh. He immediately clamps a hand over his mouth to hide his teeth, his fingers mostly in the right shape, but they all heard it. It was real. He quickly recovers and clears his throat.

"Um, yes..."

He nods. It seems like a stupid way to end this conversation, but he's becoming hyper-aware of how many people are around. Even this is higher up than he usually likes to be. He fishes around briefly for something smart to say. Or even just. Something.

"Get home in one piece, okay?"

Well, fuck, is that actually any better? Wait, no, he's got it at the last second.

"Because I don't make house calls."

Yeah, there we go. Now they can start to move their separate ways, having exchanged witty jokes as coworkers who can't afford to actually like each other that much.

There we go. Finn manages to stick the landing at the last moment, successfully completing a round of witty banter so well that Irahl will pretend to forget that laugh happened. He'll even give Finn the additional gift of making a comment at Vicent while he knows the guy is still well within earshot as he finally starts off down the sidewalk.

"...Hey. Can only break my arm at work. Sorry."

If Vincent had any plans on attempting to rip off Irahl's arms, he'll have to forget them. Doctor's orders.

It takes Vincent a moment, but they were arguing pointlessly back and forth about whether or not one of Irahl's arms could be broken that the joke connects up otherwise pretty quickly. And then he laughs--the kind of big, boisterous laugh that startles people who were standing too close. Any attention that might have been lingering on Finn is transferred to the louder, taller, weirder-looking guy in an instant.

"Damn! What a fuckin' shame..." He says, before slapping Finn in the back a little too hard, "Have a good night, Finn."

"You too..." Finn wheezes, taking that as his final cue to get out of there, before he sustains an injury or otherwise finds himself in some other situation his morals won't let him leave. He heads off past the lingering groups of people, back into that stairwell, to walk back to wherever it is he was going in the first place. Though, at the very least, he'll finally be able to take the elevator.

"...Seems like a decent guy," Vincent muses in Irahl's vague direction, once Finn's well out of earshot, "S'weird."

Edited 2025-01-15 17:27 (UTC)

Irahl begins his amble down the block in the direction that he'd been instructed to before Vincent is quite done harassing their new friend. So, he waits until the other man has caught up again before responding.

"Weird guy, or weird that he's decent?"

It may take Vincent a little bit to get going, but once he does, he has absolutely no trouble finding and following Irahl in whatever direction he's going. The guy's still got blood in his clothes, after all. Vincent could be completely shitfaced and the sweet smell of it would probably still lure him over.

He's been wondering if Finn could smell it too. And if it bothered him. He was wondering a lot of things about Finn for the last hour or so and, frankly, it's a miracle that he kept most of it to himself during their walk.

"I think it's weird that he's decent," he manages to say without too much slurring, "Seems pretty... Adjusted. Well-adjusted."

He throws his arms up and knits his fingers together behind his head, assuming the position he often takes when walking around casually with Irahl.

"But I guess I don't really know him or anythin' so maybe he's jus' good at hidin' it. An' I guess the Capitol kinda makes 'em different anyway."

The path of logic is a little fuzzy and difficult to follow for Irahl in his current state. He's not currently recalling the fact that Vincent had said similar things about himself when they'd first met, so he's not entirely sure if Vincent's comments are over Finn's heritage or some other factor.

"Your brother runs a tight ship," he ventures as a sort of all-encompassing explanation that hopefully fits whatever Vincent is getting at.

"...And he's the medic. Loose cannons make bad medics."

To Irahl's credit, Vincent's logic is pretty winding. It's a complicated topic and he's chewing very inefficiently on several ideas at once. Some part of Irahl's explanation seems to land, though, and Vincent nods and grumbles in agreement.

"Yeah, that's a good point. Gotta have a level head, huh?"

It looks like this puts his busy thoughts to rest, at least enough for him to smile and walk in idle silence for a minute or two. It may be a surprise when he suddenly reaches over to get an arm around Irahl, clapping him on the far shoulder.

"Hey bud, you feel like headin' back yet? Or do you wanna wander around an' see if we can find another drink?"

Oh, it absolutely comes as a surprise. So much so that it's only the fact that Vincent is the size of a house that keeps Irahl from drunkenly startling right out from under his arm. But the limb around Irahl's shoulder is heavy and clinging enough that the sniper only clumsily jolts a little bit away from and then right back into Vincent's side, as if he'd momentarily stumbled over his own feet.

"Uh..." Irahl begins, while his brain struggles to catch up to the companionable situation he suddenly finds himself in. "...Long as we don't head down."

Irahl's stumbling gets a quiet and only half-comprehensible warning about watching his feet, but Vincent otherwise doesn't seem to notice. Nice job, Irahl. Very smooth.

"No going down. You got it!" With confidence he absolutely does not deserve, he gives Irahl one more pat before he points at what might be some kind of park or plaza about a block ahead of them, "Let's see what's in there. Kinda think I might hear people clinkin' drinks around."

Whether or not there is actually a bar or outdoor restaurant or whatever up ahead, investigating will serve as a great excuse to not head back yet. As interesting as the diversion with Finn had been, Vincent's excited to sneak in a couple more late-night hours with his friend before he has to admit the day is over.

Irahl has never been anything even close to a partier, but he has been dragged around through late nights and even early mornings countless times. It's a hazard of the job--even if that job is just being an obligatory part of society.

Thinking of it in those terms, like he's reluctantly doing his buddy a favor, makes it easier for him to ignore the fact that he's having fun. Gotta keep that internal smokescreen going for his own sake.

So, he dutifully helps steer the two of them around posts and people and other obstacles on the way to whatever destinations Vincent hones in on up ahead.

Maybe it would surprise Irahl to learn that Vincent's never considered himself a partier either. It's not a very accurate assumption on Vincent's part, since he actually enjoys most aspects of partying quite a bit. But he's never gone out of his way to do it, and hearing about all of Robin's escapades have only further turned him away from the idea in recent years.

So he keeps surprising himself with how much fun he's having. They drift from spot to spot, he keeps asking Irahl stupid questions about what things look like, Irahl keeps giving him stupid answers. They get nowhere. They wander. They chat about equally stupid things. There are stretches where they don't say anything, really, reduced to a couple of barely-verbal grunts and a tap on the arm if someone's about to wander into traffic or Vincent decides they should take a sudden left.

Somewhere in that comfortable haze, Vincent meets two other drunks and somehow acquires more drinks. There's a big, fenced off garden where they're being served. The two giants stand around, probably making fun of people who throw garden parties while sipping down whatever they were handed. They leave with a beer each, which... Honestly, Vincent might have stolen them, for all either of them can remember.

Somehow, very late, they find their way back to the hotel. After pretending to be as sober as possible to get through the lobby of the building, Vincent stops at a crossroads.

"I think they have a bar...?" The hotel bar, of course. He's facing in the vague direction he remembers it being, "Y'want dinner or anythin'?"

This is the closest he has gotten to the feeling of being able to wander freely through a city in a long time. Even back home, those rights had been taken away. It feels good to move around without direction, without something keeping him on a short leash, and the illusion of open air here is complete enough for him to believe it.

However, stronger than even that is how much he is again reminded of the best times they'd had in space. The aimless camaraderie, the pointless whims, feeling metaphorically weightless (and only metaphorically; he'd hated the literal kind). And while he isn't generally a fan of other people, being somewhere with a real population instead of an imaginary one at least gives him something other than empty walls to be surrounded by.

He'd happily stopped thinking a long time ago. It's almost jarring to be asked a question that needs an actual answer.

Not like he's going to let that get in the way of his detachment now, though. He at least tries to get away with answering Vincent with the verbal equivalent of a shrug.

Since Irahl doesn't have a strong opinion one way or another, Vincent has to think. He stands there, taking up more of a doorway than he should, brows furrowed as though he was working through a tough decision.

He's not. He's picturing trying to order food and immediately getting annoyed with all the questions he'd probably have to answer to make it happen. He's probably protested being called lazy at a few points over the course of this night, but he did walk halfway up and down the city today. His feet are tired. They've got food up in the room.

"Alright," he decides, turning most of the way in the direction of the stairs that lead up to the third floor, "Let's just eat the fridge stuff..."

He leads the way, walking right into a doorframe.

He stops back, apologizes briefly to the doorframe, and course-corrects for the stairs beyond the doorframe.

It's probably a good thing that Vincent decides against it, because if he's getting annoyed imagining having to answer questions, you know Irahl couldn't be convinced to help in that regard for anything in the world.

And it's a good sign that their brunch adventure can finally be allowed to come to an end when Irahl's mood doesn't begin to tank at the mere thought of returning to the confines of their room. He's even beginning to wonder (very distantly) if it was a good idea for his still-healing and apparently still-bleeding body to have spent so many hours today wandering and drinking. So, he doesn't mind when the call is finally made and they turn toward the stairs.

Not before one final distraction, of course. Vincent may have apologized to the doorframe, but as Irahl passes by, he doesn't let it get off so easily.

Knowing that his friend will catch it, Irahl mutters a quiet but dire warning to the inanimate object before he follows up the stairs.

"Watch it."

Huh. Vincent turns his head to listen better, gets halfway through asking who Irahl is talking to, and then the joke hits him and thoroughly demolishes the rest of the sentence.

It starts with a real snort of a laugh and ends with him leaning helplessly on the railing of the stairs, trying to catch his breath. This may not even be the alcohol talking, that joke may have just been a perfect strike directly to the center of his sense of humor.

Okay, after struggling to breathe and swearing a little, they can get going again.

Wow, he hadn't expected to get much of a reaction at all, so he's a little startled to see what a sucker-punch his stupid joke ends up being.

Vincent's reaction is just as stupid as the joke had been, to the point that it can't help but become contagious. Irahl's surprised and almost-disappointed scoff quickly cracks into lazy and definitely-disappointed chuckling.

Ambling up behind Vincent on the stairs, he only half-jokingly puts a hand on his back and sort of braces his elbow, both encouraging him to continue up the stairs and making sure he doesn't stumble and fall back down them.

"Don't fall. Stupid way to die."

While their mutual acquaintance and roommate would probably burst a blood vessel at the thought of such a kind and intimate gesture coming from this particular dragon... It doesn't feel very romantic at the moment. Vincent probably does need it, especially as he coughs to clear something out of his windpipe.

"Shit," he wheezes, "That's a fuckin'... Assassination attempt..."

But the light brush with death might clear his head a little bit. He continues up, complaining about how he doesn't want to have to tell his brother that he died because he thought a joke was too funny (and he does phrase it that way, despite it being technically impossible to tell anyone anything when you're dead). By the time they reach their floor, he's got things under control again and goes fishing through his large pants pockets for their key.

"I guess there's booze in the room..." He pulls out a receipt from the brunch place, crunches it uselessly in his hand until he realizes it's not a key, and goes back to looking, "But I dunno, I might be good... What time is it, anyway...?"

You know, with the weird connection between the twins and Vincent's bizarre belief in ghosts, if there is anyone who would be able to get a pointless message across after death, it would be Vincent telling his brother the absurd way he'd died.

This is what Irahl is idly thinking about as he leans against the wall next to the door and watches Vincent struggle. He knows very well that he has his own key to the room with him right now, but he is unmoved to help.

And then Vincent asks him that question.

"Dark."

Who does he think he's asking?? Does he think Irahl brought his work watch with him or something? Ridiculous.

It's a question that Vincent has been idly asking Irahl since... Probably the day they met, and it's a question he will likely continue to ask him no matter how many times he gets a pointless and unhelpful answer back. At least he's gotten pretty used to never hearing a number out of the other guy.

"Eh, dark o'clock... 'Splains why it's so cold in here..."

It's not that cold. The interior of the hotel actually has a pretty stable temperature. He means it more in the sense of 'in here' being 'inside the Capitol', where the freezing cold vacuum of night had been easier to feel out on the glass-covered streets.

He finally procures a key. He feels around for the lock, and blindly navigates said key into said lock after several failed attempts. This is not helped by the fact that he's distracted by the time thing, still.

"Y'remember when I used to ask you what time it was an' you'd always just say 'dark', 'cause there was never a sun or nothin'? Least now I might get a 'bright' every once in a while..."

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