I Thought Perhaps We Could Sit Down for Tea [OPEN, June 25]

[dead_black_eyes]

Characters: L Lawliet and OPEN to anyone
Location: Death By Pastry
Rating: PG
Time: June 25
Description: 104 degree heat and being blind aren't dissuading L from shaking his cabin fever and going out to do something. Without help. In public. If you recognize him under all those seasonally inappropriate layers and the bulky cyborg sunglasses, flag him down and harass him. He'll run into a lamp post before he can run very far.



It was more difficult to see the little flashing lights on the insides of his glasses
in broad daylight. Contrast between light and dark was all L could see, and the Sun interfered significantly with that meager aptitude. Not as much as it could have, due to what L could only conclude was considerable cloud coverage, but going was still slow, breathing air that was so hot and humid he might as well have been moving through bathwater.

He refused to carry a cane, which made traffic difficult, but he took the roads that weren't as busy, counting steps, pausing to listen as his cameras read text and relayed the information to him via his ear bud. Altogether, minus a few jarring bumps into bewildered strangers and city sounds that blended confusingly into one another, it was a smooth enough journey to one of L's old haunts, Death City's pastry shop.

He was almost unrecognizable, dressed inappropriately for the sweltering heat, with a winter coat piled on top of a sweater and a wide-brimmed hat that he only pushed back when he needed to "read" something. He spoke quickly and softly when he ordered his coffee with cream and eight sugars, as if concerned that someone might hear him and identify him based on the sound of his voice. When the barista handed it to him, though, trusting that he could successfully close his hand around an object that was right in front of him... well. There was only so much L could discern about the world based on a series of blinking lights.

"Damn it!" The barista hissed as the cup dropped onto the counter and they were both sprayed with flecks of hot coffee. "Man! You still have to pay for that, you know!"

L cleared his throat, taking a deep breath. When he spoke, it was in a low, measured tone.

"You're going to get me another cup of coffee and some napkins. I'm going to find a table; you can bring them to me. Take your time. You can clean this up, first."

"Huh! That's rich, you drop coffee and it spills all over the place, and now you're telling me to..."

L set his jaw. "I'm blind," he said bluntly, briefly lowering his glasses enough for the barista to see the clouded, opaque corneas.

There was an awkward silence, and then a muttered, hasty apology as the barista snatched up a rag to start mopping up the counter.

With coffee dripping from the front of his wool coat and a few people stepping helpfully aside, having heard the exchange, L pushed through the line to find an empty table.

Comments

[realimperfect]

"If that wasn't your intention perhaps you should have someone look at you before you left your apartment today. Or where ever the hell you're staying." Well, someone got irritated fast. She does, at least, take a seat so that it doesn't quite look like she's leaning in and being so heated with him standing. At least, well, she's hoping that it might draw some attention away. She's well aware that she's a little too tall to b doing those types of things without creating a scene rather easily.

... Which had probably been the point when they'd been arranging her genes, but, moving on..

"... That's disgusting." As if anyone would have considered it a fun time. "I'm not quite sure I really want to know this story more than I want to move down a floor or two.."

[dead_black_eyes]

If L was getting irritated fast, it at least seemed that he was hardly alone in that regard. He heard the scrape of a chair and when she spoke again, it was coming from a lower point, so he could surmise that she had taken a seat.

It was too much trouble to simply walk away. He might have if he was still a seeing person and the walk home didn't promise to be such a trial. So he did the same, fingers closing around the back of the chair and pulling it out far enough to slide into it.

"You're the one who asked," he reminded her tetchily. "And I'm the one who dealt with the worst of it, the fear and the stink and the kind of pain I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. So pardon my affront to your delicate sensibilities."

[realimperfect]

"I'm mainly wondering what the hell you're up to that there were apparently bodies in the apartment next door to me, and I didn't know until what I can only assume is much later." Perhaps she was still living in Romdeau, in that respect, expecting such a high level of personal interaction in the way of letting people know what was going on in their lives, those kinds of things. Not even necessarily their lives - but neighbors would generally make a neighbor aware of things like parties, exploding dead bodies.. etc.

Just another thing about Death City she still had yet to settle in to.

[dead_black_eyes]

"If you really want to know, I had a stalker who was out to make me pay for imagined but serious slights. That meant making my life as much like hell as he could manage for a month until his sudden recall via BREW, and I'm left actually being very grateful that no one else took the hit. So this level of indignance... offense, even, that you were not more aware... it's probably not appropriate."

[realimperfect]

"And so, what? You dealt with it silently?" Well.. in a way, Re-l at least knew how that felt. Strangely enough more things that they had alike clicked in to place the more she interacted with him, though.. she wasn't sure she really approved. Plus... there was no way his stalker was a proxy, right?

.. If those things had managed to follow her here... But of course, no apology follows, as she's digging in to her next order of business.

"Do you think BREW recalled him due to his behavior, or is what that box does still seemingly random?"

[dead_black_eyes]

L regarded her wearily at her seemingly unimpressed deduction.

"Yes. I dealt with it. Silently, with my partner's help. Not a bad way to handle things in Death City, with how fascinated people are with the business of others."

He was able to move on with her, fortunately. L's pride was purely external, and he wasn't going to demand or wait on an apology; an admission that he was right was hardly required for him to believe, fully and truly, that he was.

"I think it's highly possible. Not testable. But certainly possible. He was making a lot of threats, and planning to do a lot of things that would certainly be detrimental to the war effort. Fortunately, he only got to carry out one of them."

[realimperfect]

"It could be much worse, in that respect." Coming from a place like Romdeau, Death City was tame in its need for some sort of gossip about its guests, particularly the ones that had assumed some sort of power or quite simply didn't just lay low and try to make it through. But she wouldn't bore him with stories of invaded privacy and a the massive 'big brother' complex of Romdeau's security structure.

No one really wanted to hear about that.

"Hm. That would be something interesting to test. Unfortunately, though, I don't think it would be an effective test to 'convert' people in to villains, or something of the like.

[dead_black_eyes]

Inwardly, L bristled slightly at her smooth agreement that it could be much worse. That was supposed to be evidence of his bravery and a segue into admiration and respect, not expected behavior that garnered blithely indifferent responses.

Not that L would have been in congratulatory awe of someone who went above and beyond the call of duty, either. In his world, only the superior surrounded him, and he expected superior and noble behavior from them.

It was only special, to him, because he was so seldom noble.

"It can't be tested," he said, without hesitation. "Anything we do consciously would be tainted by bias and knowledge that interferes with the hypothesis. I know for a fact that there are some very unsavory and perhaps even evil people here, but they've remained for awhile. Besides... the man responsible for this wasn't a villain, he was just sick."

[realimperfect]

Unfortunately, he would have to save the world in the style of Atlas for Re-l to afford him anything that he was expecting. High expectations of everyone were probably an ill fated carry over from her own world, though Re-l had yet to realize that, in all honesty.

Eventually, though. Perhaps.

"Sick, right." The good news was that she hadn't had the chance to run in to this man, to her knowledge, and she wasn't about to be upset that she hadn't. She'd dealt with her own version of a stalker, and though the outcome hadn't been quite as... disgusting, she still would not repeat it. Though she has to agree with him, on his criticisms of that experiment, nodding as she taps her lips with a manicured finger, thinking about all of this all over again. "There are people here that may not be anyone's... prime choice of citizen. However..."

She pauses, choosing words carefully. "There has to be a reason they were brought here. Or at least, that would make more sense than a random process of picking and choosing those who may or may not be able to assist in a war of this scale."

[dead_black_eyes]

The mental states of Beyond, and any of the other successors, and even L himself were strange, sore, sensitive subjects. It was probably a good thing that Re-L hadn't seen for herself what an utter wreck of a human being Beyond had become, if only because he was such a convincing fascimile of L himself and what he might have been if he'd cracked earlier than he was supposed to.

"But does there have to be a reason? To assume so is to assume that BREW has far more omniscience and control than we've been led to believe, and I am not comfortable assuming that at all."

[realimperfect]

"One would hope that something supposedly bringing in more forces for a war would at least be choosing wisely instead of at random, is all." Of course, that was also placing faith in a machine, but she'd been born and raised to trust in a machine named Iggy, hadn't she? But that was something of her own breeding, and something she was quickly learning was not quite the same in Death City.

Of course, it shouldn't have taken so long, but details were details.

[dead_black_eyes]

"I don't know about you... but trusting the wisdom of a higher power sounds, to me, far too much like putting stock in the idea of destiny. As long as I can believe that the true decisions governing my life are my own, and everything else is a stupid, random accident... then my existence, at least, is not meaningless. It wouldn't be blessed... but it wouldn't be cursed, either. And that is actually comforting."

[realimperfect]

"Fair enough." That was something she could agree with, at the very least, though the being who had been meant to control the dome she was born in was... in a way.. currently living and working with her. She wouldn't trust someone like Vincent Law to make the calls over an entire civilization, anyway.

"Though the question on why we were all brought here gnaws at me, still."

[dead_black_eyes]

"So... It would disturb you if there was no reason. If it was just a stupid accident, a random occurrence?"

[realimperfect]

"Disturb is too rich a term. I would say... 'bother.' Though, in reality, that would more than likely be because of the fact that in my world, in Romdeau, nothing was done without a very specific reason. It... goes against everything I was ever taught or knew, more so than anything else." And in that she was quickly finding out there was a ways to go, before she would ever be as 'normal' as other people in this city. Not that 'normal' would ever be something measurable, but increasingly she was realizing that her version of normal, and other people's, weren't nearly the same thing.

"That habit has yet to go away, unfortunately."

[dead_black_eyes]

He stared straight ahead, closing his eyes. His corneas, damaged beyond functionality, tended to get tender and sore, even when merely exposed to the blinking lights on the inside of his lenses.

"I'd say that you preexisting bias is more than likely to blame," he agreed dully. "But if I lived in such a world, I wouldn't see much point in trying to live a satisfying life. If I was miserable, it would mean that I was meant to be, and that trying for anything else would be nothing short of a selfish attempt to uproot the master plan."

Not that L, of all people, had any respect for a master plan that was not his own. What he was really saying was that such a world would disagree with him, provided he wasn't the one in control of it.

[realimperfect]

"That 'master plan' shit was what landed me in trouble in the first place." Well, more so her attempts and eventual success in uprooting her grandfather and Daedalus' master plan for her, but she wasn't going to get in to those details with L. After all, she doubted he would care to hear it just as much as she doubted she would care enough to repeat the details with any level of accuracy, at the moment.

"Life isn't satisfying when everything is utopia laid at your feet. It's a restless, strangely needy existence despite having everything and nothing all at once. Any material item you could want would be delivered to the door in minutes but things like choices and privacy were the expense for them more so than money exchanged." Which was why, despite her irritations with Death City, she enjoys the trial and tribulation more so than the rigid and scheduled days in Romdeau where she was watched like a hawk no matter what she was doing for fear that her nature would lead her to things inadvisable.

[dead_black_eyes]

"Do you think it's a basic human need? Wanting to feel like you're in control of your life, even when everything is provided for you? And do you agree with the statement that random accidents of happenstance are preferable to being controlled by someone else?"

[realimperfect]

"It may well be." For her, though, the debate was whether she enjoyed it now because she'd been denied it previously, or whether it was actually a need. Some people showed a complete disinterest in being control of themselves, after all, so it seemed a bit redundant to ask. "Though, others are perfectly content without control, so it may more be a question of conditioning and nature."

"I prefer to be in control of all things, if possible. Even though it's irrational."

[dead_black_eyes]

"Most people prefer that, actually, when it is an option, unless they think so little of themselves that they don't trust their own judgment to benefit them. But sometimes it's not an option... and I think that BREW proves as much. Whether it is a random phenomenon or a sentient being with a purpose... the result is same, but the intent has some pretty large existential implications."

[realimperfect]

"Of course. I, for one, am not going to complain about BREW too badly. For all the situation it's put me in, it's still better than wandering the wastes on the Rabbit with two autoreivs and Vincent, so far as I'm concerned." Not that she entirely minded Vincent's presence. But the other two... those were negligible.

[dead_black_eyes]

"Are you going to die?" L asked casually. "That is... to your knowledge, do you know about your death, when it will occur, and whether or not it could possibly be avoided? Of course I mean your home world.

[realimperfect]

"Eventually, yes." She's resolved to that, at least. Their luck will eventually run out, their supplies. Hell, if the sun comes out too strongly herself and Vincent may find themselves less than disposed toward living and breathing any longer. Such was life, back in their world.

"I don't know specifics, but yes. Eventually. And probably sooner, rather than later."

[dead_black_eyes]

"But you don't know specifics. If you could, would you want to know?"

[realimperfect]

"... No. I wouldn't want to know that. If only because knowledge like that is uncomfortable." And because she wouldn't want to know the exact manner in which she died unless it was pleasant. Knowing where they'd come from... she doubted it would be anything close to pleasant. At all.