psychoshenanigans | Nor // AUAU

Entry tags:

nel,
robin

Nor // AUAU

Robin wakes up long before Nel does. He leaves the bed to empty the bath and take a quick shower himself, returning dried and clothed before his companion has so much as budged. He crawls over to him again to revel in his find, delight in how he looks now that he's clean. It's silly to be so happy over such a little scrap of a person like this, but he can't help it. Now that he's his, he can't help but take pride in him.

Not that Nel knows he belongs to Robin now... He wonders if his previous owner is even concerned. A pity, to waste such a nice thing on people as low and tasteless as them.

He lays there, perfectly content, moving strands of hair away from his eyes, glad that he can touch him again. He's making a mental checklist--still much too thin, too sickly--of all the things they will need to improve. He has some contacts to make and some arrangements to see to. That paper bag won't last forever.

It's nice to have a project, even if he knows he'll regret it later.

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He's clean and safe, tucked somewhere quiet, so he wakes up long after he normally would. There's no hungover bodies shuffling around to wake him, no threat, no standing order to drag himself home by a certain time, so his body lets him sleep. He knows he's with someone who will do something with him or send him home when they want.

So, the first thing he feels as he's surfacing toward consciousness again, is confusion. He can tell immediately that it's later than usual. The room doesn't spin when he squints his eyes open. Instead of bobbing in some queasy limbo, he's settled solidly in the lull that comes after a high has long since died.

Worrying before he's even awake that he's missed something important, it's a little suddenly that he's rolling over and half levering up onto an elbow, bleary eyes peeling open.

The room looks just like it did, if he can remember it. Simple furniture and a muffled quiet, nothing dangerous or pressing to be found. There are only clean blankets, dirty light, an open window out into the late afternoon.

Robin catches him immediately this time, conscious enough to make a noise and draw himself to full attention. Back into a mode of control, he reaches up for a shoulder, keeping Nel from bolting or making too many sudden movements.

"Hey..." He gives him a good smile. "Good morning."

"--Oh."

Robin's face is suddenly right there, and it brings the important memories back. There had been a long night, and something bad had happened, but Robin had come for him... and there'd been a bath? He's mostly sure that really happened.

Nel's still wrapped up half in sleep, but he remembers enough to be reassured. With a little sigh, he slumps back again.

"Morning--?" A glance to the window tells him that's probably just an expression. "What time is it?"

"Oh..." He glances towards the window as well, not having bothered to actually check what time it is. "Not actually morning. Late afternoon."

Calm is good. Relaxed is better. Robin rolls a little closer, keeps a hand on his chest so that he can feel how his heart beats under his fingers.

"How do you feel?"

His heart is fluttering, fast and noticeable--after last night, he's pretty dehydrated. He's better, less sick, but still hungover. It takes a minute to pull himself together enough to handle Robin's question.

He rubs his face, runs fingers up to mess with his hair... especially when he remembers that he went to bed with it still wet. It's probably ridiculous now. So, he does what he can to groggily rake it back into the general shape it should be, while he gives the same answer he always does.

"Okay."

Okay tells him nothing. He could be well enough, he could be much better. Even if the worst of his drunken sickness is gone, he's still got a hangover to deal with--and it looks like he's going to have to figure out how he's handling it through empirical means.

So he keeps his eyes on where he's straightening his hair, absorbed in watching the shapes of his thin fingers and the way that they move. He keeps smiling, as if the answer was perfectly acceptable.

"There's a kitchen downstairs... think you could manage moving that far?"

"Sure."

Another automatic answer, given easily. But he drops his hand like it's too heavy to hold up, and there's a rallying moment before he starts the slow task of remembering all of his limbs and rolling over. It's going to take him another minute to actually sit up.

But he's trying, following instructions with mechanical obedience. He's not all there yet, still trying to pull himself together through a mostly-miserable fog, but he's functioning as much as he needs to be. He's in work-mode.

Even though Nel's doing what he would have eventually asked, he remains unhelpfully lounged on the bed. Nel may be in work-mode, but Robin has a very bizarre definition of work.

"Are you hungry?" He tilts his head, reaches up to put a hand against his face. "I don't want you falling over or anything."

After taking another moment to gather himself after wedging up onto his elbows, he manages to roll all the way up until he's sitting properly. Wobbly where he's at and leaning on braced arms, but he's upright. And there, he manages a halfway-decent smile.

"I'll be fine."

Which only really addresses the second part, but is given as a blanket statement.

"Of course you will."

He doesn't say it mockingly, though that might have been his intent after all. He's trained for it, Robin supposes, but anyone would have a hard time with all those stairs and a liver full of poison.

He sits up. He holds him up by a shoulder and takes one of Nel's unsteady hands in his own. There is no excess to transfer, so his touch is only warm and gentle. He holds his curled fingers in the style of a true gentleman.

"But if you wouldn't mind... May I carry you?"

There's the way he's been instructed to react--keep a small smile, play up the demure. But, this time, his response is more than that. He's actually surprised by how the question is phrased; the way he ducks into his own shoulders with something like bashfulness is genuine.

He'd almost forgotten how strange Robin's requests could really be. He'd missed it.

"...If you want."

"I'd love to."

Robin is usually half-play himself, since smiles and charm will take him further than most stern orders or threats could ever manage. But when he presses his lips against his knuckles, leans down to get some arms under him, picks him up as easily as if he were one of the blankets he's sitting on, his smile is a real one.

Good thing he's small. They won't have a problem fitting through doorways.

"I'll show you around," he starts to explain, crossing the room, "This place is actually one of my projects."

It takes a bit of a twist, but he wiggles the knob open without compromising his load. What lies on the other side is a simple hallway in an old building, dimly lit and smelling of far too many previous occupants. Nondescript stained carpet, nondescript faded wallpaper, this floor has not been high on the list of renovation priorities.

He immediately feels a little spoiled. He doesn't have to do much to keep the other person happy right now, and he always feels like he gets away with murder in situations like that. On top of that, it's actually nice. And he doesn't feel good. So, desperately taking advantage of it, he sinks against Robin's chest like he's freezing.

"Projects?"

He sounds interested, and he hardly has to try for it.

"I have a few."

He tucks him up close. He wants him to be comfortable (even if his other motives are to move quickly and avoiding his otherwise inevitable collapse). He also pays attention on the stairs, since it would be terribly uncharming if he knocked his head into a support beam on the way down.

"I think I mentioned the first time I found you again... I'd have to start another. This is it."

The stairs are wooden under the thin carpet, and they creak terribly. One flight down, they hit concrete stairs and a hallway full of boxes and half-assembled machinery. Lights, rigs, scripts and costumes...

"It's kind of a club, kind of a dance studio."

Once they make it safely down the stairs, Nel finally starts to wake up a little.

"Dance studio?"

Another parroted question, but he's suddenly too absorbed in his surroundings to come up with something more eloquent. It would take a lot to get him to willingly shift at all from his settled place against Robin, so it's telling when he's trying to crane his neck and lean a little to get a better look at it all.

He'll get a better chance when Robin turns against large double doors. He opens them by pushing with his back, giving Nel an ample opportunity to see everything in the hallway that they'd just passed. Someone is putting on a show here, and Nel is soon going to be an important part of it.

"I remembered you like dancing, so..."

When the hallway is left behind, they enter the large main chamber. Once upon a time it would have looked like an enormous, gaping room, grey walls and grey ceiling all rounding to dark corners that pull you in. It would have been like stepping into the jaws of a monster. Here, now, the illusion is shattered by lush curtains and large chairs and a nervous system of catwalks and rigging all spiderwebbed left and right over their heads.

There's a stage where people are setting up for something, running tests by flashing lights on and off. A couple people are arguing distractedly over a script, while another rigs up a moon and a sun over a painted backdrop. It's an ordeal. Only a few people look over at Robin and the person he's carrying around, but he ignores them on his way towards the back of the room.

"Wow..."

Despite his exhaustion and weakness, he suddenly seems like he could try to squirm out of Robin's arms and go exploring at any moment. Sleepy eyes wide, looking more alert with each interesting thing that hooks and tugs his gaze in one direction or another, the energy of the place is linking right up to his veins and filling them up with life again.

"...You run all this?"

"Yeah."

There's another set of double doors back in the corner. It's behind a bar, something big and well-stocked and very much in the style of other nightclubs that Robin has been to. The neon lights aren't on, but Nel should find it familiar anyway.

Behind those doors is a large room that's been forced into the image of a kitchen, things plugged in with thick cords that run out to generators in the back. It's mostly clean, even if it looks like this stuff could be and often is moved around to better suit whatever large body is cooking.

Robin finds a counter to set Nel down on. He'll have to keep himself propped up while Robin looks for a clean glass in the cupboards above his head.

"I used to do this back home, actually," he explains, accompanied by the clinking of glass, "Maybe not as big, but..."

"Wow."

Thinking up a better word is too difficult, with all the awe taking up space in his brain. He's got other things to focus on. He keeps himself sitting up just fine, even braving to lean on his arms to try and see peer out the doors back toward the bar again. Then his attention returns to the kitchen, swiveling around to figure out all the little details.

It makes him dizzy, but he doesn't mind.

"There's a lot here."

"There is. Drink this."

After a second to fill it, he pushes a glass of water into his hands. It seems like the best place to start. If he can't keep water down, food will be a pointless endeavor.

With the easy part over with, Robin slides up onto the counter next to him, brushing up against his shoulder. The sounds from the stage are all muffled from here, kind of tinny, as if they were in a giant fishtank.

"I guess I should explain why you're here."

He manages the water just fine, and after a first careful sip, he manages it maybe a little too quickly. He's on his second big gulp when Robin pulls his attention from where he's watching the appliance cords and wondering where they go.

With a set-up like that, Robin has Nel's eyes flicking toward him from over the edge of the glass in an instant. All that awe makes a cautious and quiet retreat from his face, leaving polite blankness with just a hint of nerves around the line of his mouth.

"Okay."

"Mm." He wonders how long it would be otherwise, until Nel would have asked him why he's still there and not somewhere else. A few days, maybe a week if he's really avoiding the thought of going back. He wonders if that would have been any easier for him.

"The short story is that you work for me now," he says, almost immediately holding up a finger to stop whatever ideas would have started spinning by in Nel's head, "But not how you'd think. I want you to stay as one of my dancers."

After Robin cuts off his initial question or comment, he just kind of stalls there. He's running into a concept that his brain is having a hard time trying to absorb.

He blinks, and glances without actually moving his head anywhere while he tries to work it over. It feels like this should make sense, but nothing clicks. He just quietly balks.

Did they talk about something that he doesn't remember? Maybe it's a joke. He's missing something, and he doesn't want to say the wrong thing.

"You'll continue here as a collar as well, but that will come second."

He's saying this all as if it's indisputable fact. He doesn't know if he's necessarily allowed to do this sort of thing, but it's not as though anyone is going to stop him.

"I will see to it that you're given what you need, assuming you're willing."

He taps the back of his heel on the cabinet. "That's all. Do you understand?"

"...You bought me?"

He's finally found enough pieces in shapes that he recognizes, and he's assembled them into something. This is at least a concept that he comprehends, as jarring and unexpected as it is, and he's hesitant about voicing it.

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