Dr. Adrien Arbuckal (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
prorenataa) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thisavrou_log2016-06-13 10:02 pm
prorenataa) wrote in thisavrou_log2016-06-13 10:02 pm
Entry tags:
[Closed] It's too early for this discussion
Who: Tony Stark and Adrien Arbuckal
When: Off shift on the 13th
Where: Observation Deck [Aft]
What: A conversation
Warnings: Possible discussion of murder and violence
After signing off with Tony Adrien had indulged in a fit of trying to put his fist through the Moira bulkhead. It hadn't gone very well for the doctor.
The good news being as a doctor he was able to treat the busted knuckles of his right hand himself, eventually settling down enough to put his focus back on his project to collect supplies for medical. Throwing himself into the nuts and bolts of coordinating the effort before eventually having to break off and call his shift done for the time being.
After all the stores he wanted to visit weren't likely to be open at this hour.
Heading back to his quarters, Adrien had indulged in a shower (because he's a neat freak honestly) washing away the busy day and attempting to quell the rise of anxiety in his gut. As it got closer to the hour Tony had said he'd be off shift, the greater the desire to call this conversation off grew. It was going to dig into areas that Adrien was trying torun from ignore and ...
"How the fuck do I even begin." He said aloud at one point.
With only Courser to hear him, the young bahari had been glued to his side ever since the network conversation, Adrien stared at his reflection until his own face blurred in the glass. He went back to his quarters and dressed in civvies he'd picked up down on the planet, dark slacks and a deep maroon button down shirt, a leather coat lay out across his bed for when they left their room. Sliding his holster onto the belt, he secured it at the small of his back before simply sitting looking at the floor.
That would be how Tony found him. Sitting on the edge of his bed, eyes on the floor between his feet, worrying at the ring that set on his right middle finger, obviously lost to his own thoughts. Courser lay quietly on the bed just behind him, chin on his paws but the constant twitching of his ears suggested an air of anxiety.
When: Off shift on the 13th
Where: Observation Deck [Aft]
What: A conversation
Warnings: Possible discussion of murder and violence
After signing off with Tony Adrien had indulged in a fit of trying to put his fist through the Moira bulkhead. It hadn't gone very well for the doctor.
The good news being as a doctor he was able to treat the busted knuckles of his right hand himself, eventually settling down enough to put his focus back on his project to collect supplies for medical. Throwing himself into the nuts and bolts of coordinating the effort before eventually having to break off and call his shift done for the time being.
After all the stores he wanted to visit weren't likely to be open at this hour.
Heading back to his quarters, Adrien had indulged in a shower (because he's a neat freak honestly) washing away the busy day and attempting to quell the rise of anxiety in his gut. As it got closer to the hour Tony had said he'd be off shift, the greater the desire to call this conversation off grew. It was going to dig into areas that Adrien was trying to
"How the fuck do I even begin." He said aloud at one point.
With only Courser to hear him, the young bahari had been glued to his side ever since the network conversation, Adrien stared at his reflection until his own face blurred in the glass. He went back to his quarters and dressed in civvies he'd picked up down on the planet, dark slacks and a deep maroon button down shirt, a leather coat lay out across his bed for when they left their room. Sliding his holster onto the belt, he secured it at the small of his back before simply sitting looking at the floor.
That would be how Tony found him. Sitting on the edge of his bed, eyes on the floor between his feet, worrying at the ring that set on his right middle finger, obviously lost to his own thoughts. Courser lay quietly on the bed just behind him, chin on his paws but the constant twitching of his ears suggested an air of anxiety.
no subject
Still, the fact that he's here at all is testament to their earlier conversation. The thing about Tony vs. machines is that he's never actually done, and the official bounds of his shift mean less than jack to him. He works as long as he wants to, even if he was meant to be asleep several days ago. He'd been prepared to do that tonight, as well, except that he'd remembered promising Adrien 8 o'clock at exactly 8:11.
Could've been worse.
He drops a small satchel of tools just inside the doorway as he walks in, giving Adrien an odd look from under a quirked eyebrow.
"What the hell did you do to your hand?"
It wasn't bandaged last time he saw the guy, which might have been this morning, or last night, or yesterday morning — actually, he's not sure. He sucks at this.
no subject
It wasn't until the satchel of tools landed on the floor that Adrien even looked up, blinking as he realized Tony had arrived. The question earned the man a bemused blink as if he hadn't just been looking at his hands and he flexed his fingers in a pensive gesture, considering a response.
In the end, he went with honesty. "Doesn't fucking matter." It really didn't.
Standing up, he reached back to grab his jacket moving to tug it on while Courser stood up and jumped off the bed.
"You going to wear your goggles through the ship? They're making a hell of a statement out of your hair."
no subject
But, well, whatever.
Tony sniffs in an artfully offended manner. "Excuse you," said as he haphazardly pulls the goggles off and tosses them on top of the abandoned satchel. It does nothing to help the hair situation or the motor oil situation, and he must know it, from the way he smirks. "I always look fantastic, no matter what my hair is doing."
no subject
The issue of his hand was already being forgotten.
The bahari trotted over to the satchel and goggle to sniff at them, shamelessly curious as ever, despite any and all glares he received from Tony. Just like a cat; the more Tony glared the more Courser seemed determined to be friends.
"Aft observation deck okay with you? It's nice and romantic but has shit for food." Adrien couldn't have choked down a nutrition bar at the moment but he wasn't about to admit that, and if Tony bitched about being hungry they could head to the Mess. But if this conversation was going to happen it was going to have to be at the far ass end of the ship.
Honestly, he'd briefly considered the engine room but he didn't want Tony getting distracted by shinny engine parts.
no subject
For whatever reason, a brief shadow crosses Tony's face at Adrien's mention of the observation deck, but he doesn't remark upon it, and it's gone so quickly it's as if it never was. He doesn't shoo Courser away from the satchel, either, even if he does take a petulant half-step away from him. He offers an airy shrug.
"I'm poor in this universe, so dinner-without-dinner sounds ideal to me." He'd had a coffee at 5:30. A poor substitute for a meal, probably, but calories nonetheless. And more importantly: caffeine. Food isn't exactly essential to his happiness at the moment. If things get truly dire — and from his roommate's demeanor, he's half-expecting they will — the bar will call to him first.
"Shall we?" He turns to the door he'd barely gotten one foot through, gesturing for Adrien to follow.
no subject
Coffee is a very underrated food group. It's got water and ... caffeine and caffeine and water. Two of the most essential building blocks of a nutritional diet. At least that was the line Adrien fed himself when he was subsisting on the stuff in medical.
"I was fairly certain our meals on board ship were covered?" Adrien remarked, stepping through the doorway, his hands sliding into his pockets as he took up a purposeful walk through the hallway. He expected Tony wouldn't have an issue keeping up.
It was an inane comment, just filler really and the doctor wasn't overly invested in whether or not the conversation continued as they walked. But he remembered that Tony liked to chatter and listen to his own voice. This suited Adrien just fine and if he could send the man down a fairly innocuous path for their stroll, he'd just shut up and nod at appropriate times.
no subject
"'There's no such thing as a free lunch,'" he intones blandly. "Though I suppose our indentured servitude might be considered recompense here. Free credit card aside, I mean, but everyone wasted no time telling me that's not a typical thing, and that the space mafia will probably be coming to collect their payment any day now."
He talks like somebody who's very used to talking to themselves all day, probably because he is. Though he would argue that talking to non-sentient machines is a perfectly valid form of conversation. They seem to understand him just fine.
"Though the work could be worse, I mean, they at least made a vague attempt to pander to our strengths. You do your doctor thing and I do my machine-doctor thing and everybody is happ—well, not happy, probably, because holy shit, we've been kidnapped onto the space Titanic - not making any prophetic statements there, by the way, I just think the ship layout's kinda similar to a vintage cruise ship - but at least minimally miserable. The expected amount of miserable."
The stream of words only trails off when they hit the observation deck, at which point he does pocket his hands, flicking fleeting glances at the glass before turning his attention elsewhere.
no subject
His own mind was a morass of uncertainty and painful memory. He’d gone back to events he had tried very hard to block out of his conscious thoughts, dredging up history that was best forgotten. Adrien wanted to hide from all of it but he recognized that if he was going to properly explain what had happened, he was going to need to give Tony the full picture.
Because a partial view was going to be an ugly sight indeed.
Unaware that the observatory may hold some anxiety for his current companion, Adrien stepped into the glass enclosed space and felt a sense of rightness settle over him. The observation room was empty, but Adrien still paced its length, exhibiting a high level of caution before he eventually made his way back towards where Tony stood.
His hands came out of his pockets as he paced towards one of the floor to ceiling glass windows and looked outwards. If Tony was paying attention, he might notice that Adrien didn’t look down at the planets beneath the Moira but rather outwards, towards the darkness of space.
Adrien had wrestled with how to even begin this … madness, contemplating a number of approaches, up to even this point where he rejected the idea he thought he’d settled upon and went with something completely different.
“Your name is Anthony Edward Stark, you’re a genius specializing in technological advances and innovative ideas, which is the only reason you’re alive today. “ He turned and nodded towards Tony’s chest. “Embedded in your chest is a miniature power source you call an ‘Arc Reactor’, which powers electromagnets that are currently keeping pieces of shrapnel from shredding your heart.”
He gave a brief pause for Tony to absorb the words but then moved to explain further.
“Not information you throw around, well the bit about the Arc Reactor, you’re not shy about your genius,” small amendment there. “But I know because I was a senior physician aboard a ship called the Neheda and responsible for your well-being for over a year of intense combat situations.”
Another pause and then, in a quiet tone he continued.
“We could discuss the specifics, if you like or perhaps talk about the Avengers Initiative or your suits if you need more evidence of what I’ve just said?”
no subject
He remembers when he could look into the night sky and note feel a sense of foreboding. It wasn't that long ago.
"Nah." He goes for airy and casual but misses by a mile; it comes out sharper than he'd intended, but hearing that information spill forth so easily from the mouth of a - still, realistically - stranger... it's a little unsettling. He figures Adrien won't take it personally. "I think you've made your point."
Part of him does want him to keep talking, wants to know exactly how much of his life Adrien's unraveled from this other version of him, how much of that life even reflects his own. But there are other things to talk about, things that are probably way more important than that. And he figures he can dig for that information any time he wants, what with there being plenty of time for such conversations on this rust bucket. No, it's whatever else Adrien hasn't said yet that's causing him this much tight-lipped resignation.
"That goes a long way towards explaining a few things, though." And here Tony could've almost hoped that his genius had just been so immediately apparent that a complete stranger had accepted the truth of it in a matter of moments. Ah, well.
no subject
Though the words are sharp, Tony's right in the fact that Adrien doesn't appear to take it personally. In fact it seems to slid off him like water off a duck. Really, even if he was given to taking offense, could he blame Tony for being a bit perturbed? Adrien would be if their circumstances were reversed.
"I didn't expect I'd be able to keep it from you for very long," Adrien remarked, turning around and leaning back against the clear glass, arms crossed. "Not between your observation skills and our sharing barracks."
Hey, he could throw in a little flattery, so long as it was the truth and even as egotistical a sonofabitch as Stark was the man had reason to be so. Adrien could acknowledge that.
no subject
"Thoughtful of you to try, futility aside." It probably sounds sarcastic, but it isn't. He's had multiple people come right out and declare their familiarity with him without even batting an eye. It probably says something about Adrien's character that he'd even tried to cover it up for almost a fortnight now. He's a little grateful for it, too, because those first few days might've been harder if he'd been trying to dodge the knowing eyes of his own roommate.
"I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess the Neheda part of this conversation is where everything goes to shit?" Because there's no doubt in his mind that it's going to go to shit somewhere.
no subject
Part of him had been hoping Tony would let it go at that, though he suspected it wouldn't be that easy. The man was too damn curious. Still, at the question the doctor looked down at his feet and shifted them slightly.
He was quiet for a long while, almost long enough to count as an uncomfortable silence and perhaps a precursor to a statement of let's just forget about it. If Tony was paying attention he might see some of that struggle move past the otherwise stern expressions on the doctor's face.
But just before it could become a complete wash, Adrien spiked the toe of his boot against the floor panel and said softly.
"Actually, it began on a planet called Ajna. A 'training' planet, which was the drop site for our first mission as a new crew assigned to the Neheda, a ship in the fleet of the Cosmic Demolition Corporation."
He looked up as he said the name, just testing the waters if Tony really, really wanted to keep going down this rabbit hole.
no subject
But when Adrien continues, he starts to have some doubts. His brow furrows.
"Cosmic Demolition Corporation," he repeats flatly, almost incredulously.
no subject
"I don't know what you're contract entailed but the twist in this situation is we all, all of us, volunteered. For whatever reason, whatever we were promised or suggested, in the end we all said 'yes'."
That was an important distinction to understand, for what came next.
no subject
He has no idea if that'll actually make this guy feel any better about what this is leading up to, so he lets it drop.
"But, go on."
no subject
"No, it didn't work like that," he explained in a quiet voice. "They came to your home world, approached you, errr I'm speaking the plural 'you' I actually don't know what you were offered. But as I was saying. They came to your home world and made you an offer."
He paused, thinking back to his own recruitment, what he'd heard from others.
"It might have been something you were desperate for, the return of a dead love one, protection for loved ones in trouble, untold riches ... they knew what lay deep in your heart and they offered it. In exchange for your recruitment to their ranks."
His head had been down, as he kicked at the floor, obviously a nervous tick. Beside him, the normally gregarious Courser sat, tail lashing softly and ears held at an anxious angle, obviously responding to his companion's stress.
"Anyway, whatever it was, it wasn't until you said yes and signed your contract that you were taken. If you never said yes, you didn't go anywhere. There was no duress, except whatever already existed in your life that rendered you vulnerable enough to agree."
no subject
For a brief moment, his mind chases that idea: for what reason would his other self have agreed to conscription in an alternate universe? What did he want so badly, but couldn't achieve by his own power? He knows himself well enough to know the answer is probably "fixing something he regrets fucking up," which is ominous. Or, worse, they found him at a moment when he was so low that signing his soul away seemed like a good idea. He's fully aware of how capable he is of having those moments, too.
For that matter, what the hell had Adrien wanted so badly?
"Okay, I stand corrected. Jury's out on if this is more or less sketchy than what I originally assumed."
no subject
Those happy topics, were they ever to come up, were another conversation entirely.
"There were a lot of sketchy elements," he agreed with a wry twist of his lips. "Such as a very vague understanding of just what we were signing on to do. HQ wasn't shy about pointing out 'Cosmic Demolition Corporation' what did we expect to be doing but there are some things the mind doesn't want to imagine."
At least the sane mind. Adrien crossed his arms over his chest and was back to that quiet in how to even approach any of this. How to explain.
"We were airdropped onto Ajna, split into three groups and landing in three different areas of the planet with only a beacon on our cuffs to direct us where we were supposed to go. We had only the equipment we could carry with us, a singular gun, a knife, some food and clothing.
My group dropped in an area that forced us to cross a frozen river, in which there were these odd shark like creatures that were both aquatic and terrestrial. Tasty too."
Adrien gave his head a slight shake and dropped his arms, obviously shift and working at nervous tension.
"Long story short it was a cull. Recruits who couldn't hack it were either killed or we worked together as a team to pull our weakest links with us until we got to base camp.
This effectively set the tone of much of the training. We were broken out into four teams and each team was tested along lines specific to their function within the crew as a whole. You either stepped up or you suffered and punishments ran from scathing remarks to having your cuff shut off and if an entire team failed, the entire team suffered."
He lifted his wrist with the MID.
"With the Neheda the cuff was also your connection to all life support. Needless to say the planets we landed on were not oxygen rich or in anyway hospitable to humans or humanoids.
A team, as a whole, suffered failures on a training test. Their cuffs were shut off for 30 to 45 seconds."
Dropping his hands back down, Adrien folded them back behind himself now, into a sort of parade rest position.
"I'm not telling you this for sympathy or pity. I'm telling you this because I am trying to explain to you the stakes. We learned, very early on that disobedience was met with extreme punishment and extreme disobedience, complete refusal to work with the crew would result not only in death but the extermination of your home world. We witnessed that happen to one of the crew who openly disobeyed the Captain and the CDC HQ.
This weirdly named corporation had the ability, the reach and the utter ruthlessness to destroy everything tied to a disobedient recruit. That's what was put in the very very very fine print of the contract."
He paused, giving Tony a moment to digest, before he continued.
"Also in the fine print, was the rule that you survived or fell as a crew. Early on, on Ajna, we were witness to an attempt made against HQ by another ship. The Almina. This covert attempt was perpetrated only by a small percentage of the crew. HQ retrieved a few individuals who reported the attempt, put the rest in chains in the hold of the ship and, making sure their other ships witnessed it, they blew the ship up."
He paused again, though this time it was perhaps more obviously because even now, that memory affected him. But Adrien took a breath, settled himself and continued.
"Thousands, paid for the actions of a handful. HQ was ... big on their object lessons and they had eyes and ears everywhere.
The situation slowly but steadily became painfully clear. We were up against a god power, with infinite reach and ruthless disregard for any planet, any species. Taking this entity on, head on and from the outside, was suicide and not just for you but for anyone connected to you."
Adrien held up his right hand, splaying his fingers and showing Tony the simple ring on his middle finger. It was silver, with inset blue enamel, fairly unobtrusive and not particularly fashionable.
"This ring, is CDC technology," he explained. "It produces a force shield, that lasts for ten minutes and has a three hour recovery period. When activated, I could stand at ground zero of a nuclear blast and not turn a hair."
Well, you know, beyond the basic human desire to run like hell.
"This is just a very minor piece of technology that was at their disposal."
He lowered continued the lift of his hand, brushing it through his hair and then taking a deep breath, before he continued with the next bit. It was hard, after having lived under the threat of discovery, to say these words aloud and even as he made himself explain, he felt a chill down his spine, a desire to look over his shoulder.
"However, there were indications if you looked, that the house wasn't as clean as HQ believed it was. If you get my meaning?"
1/2
But holding entire planets hostage? That's...
Something else entirely. Something new.
Tony turns away abruptly, around the time Adrien starts detailing ruthless higher powers with the ability to wipe out planets on a whim. His chest suddenly feels too tight in his shirt, hand going to his collar as if he wants to loosen it, but can't. Worse, there's nowhere to look in this goddamned observatory that isn't a vast, celestial expanse.
He pictures a portal that frames a big, blue, vulnerable planet. A totally unsuspecting planet. A planet that never stood a chance.
"Jesus." It comes out strained, because this is all of his worst fears being re-packaged and delivered from the mouth of a stranger. His other self must have had a fucking blast.
no subject
"What, they just let you walk out with that?"
There's another question buried in that one: how the hell did he get out of that?
no subject
Just as the Ingress had taken all of them.
"The truth is ... " he began only to pause because something odd was unfolding.
Had Adrien not been locked into his own personal hell he might have noticed before now, that Tony was struggling, with their location at least. But the doctor had been so inwardly focused on how he was going to explain things, focused on ripping the bandages off the open wounds of his own circumstances, that he hadn't been paying attention.
However, someone had.
Courser. The bahari tracker, with his keen nose and his empathetic manner had picked up on the subtle scents that came with the slow build of panic. He was smart enough to have picked up on the fact that he wasn't Tony's favorite creature (though he still planned to make friends!) and so he'd stayed back but he could scent that which Tony was trying to choke back.
The rise of adrenaline, the pitch scent of anxiety, the increased heart-rate.
The young tracker shifted towards the man who roomed with his companion but then stepped back and turned towards the doctor. He vocalized, soft and low but a worried, eerie sort of scream that spoke of anxiety.
Adrien glanced at Courser worriedly, immediately thinking the anxiety was the bahari's own, perhaps raised by Adrien's own ... issues. But as he watched the cat fighting the urge to go to Tony, he began to question what exactly was going on.
"Tony?" He asked, frowning and dropping the subject of his own history for the moment. Now that his focus was on the man, he coudl see the sheen of sweat that seemed out of place in the chill of this room.
And hell, he hadn't even gotten to the bad parts yet.
"Tony, what's wrong?" There was a stern, doctor type tone to that question. The sort of tone that suggested 'don't waste your time or mine by bullshitting'.
no subject
"Did E.T. just snitch on me?" He sounds torn between exasperation and a strange, mirthless humor. What is his life coming to? He shoots Courser a glare. "Snitches get stitches, you know."
A completely empty threat, of course. He just takes a moment to school his expression before turning back around, shoving the image of alien armies and planet-ending godlike entities out of his mind.
"Cosmic entities with the ability to destroy everything I know tend to give me existential crises." A touch of his usual dry sarcasm creeps back in, here. "I'm fine. You were about to confess to some probably-horrifying truth bomb?"
no subject
This was often the case.
Adrien was scowling and he'd arched an eyebrow as he was now paying closer attention to Tony's body language and particularly that sheen of sweat. Honestly, it was too cold in this part of the ship for either of them to be sweating.
"Yes, well ..." it was only going to get worse.
He'd brought them here because for Adrien there was something comforting about the vastness of space beyond them. A sense that perhaps CDC HQ's reach couldn't extend all this way, that he truly was lost and freed from the threat they posed.
But Tony really didn't seem comfortable and the conversation was just going to go down hill from here. Not that it was on particularly good footing to begin with.
"How about we find somewhere with seats for the rest of the story?"
See! He could have empathy! Okay, he could have empathy when Courser reminded him to pay attention.
no subject
Still, part of him wants to protest and insist they stay right where they are. It's ridiculous. It's just a conversation, it's just a room with a near-360 glimpse into the vastness of space, it's just a tiny alien with creepy feeler-things making obnoxiously perceptive observations about him. There is no justifiable cause for undue alarm.
And yet the tightness in his chest persists, against all logic, so he just offers a stiff nod.
"Yeah, sure." A long beat. "Somewhere with real walls and a stiff drink would also be ideal."
no subject
Courser's feelers are not creepy! They're actually quite soft if you touch them.
For the moment, however, Adrien pulled up his MID to orient himself in the ship.
"Alright, the bar area at the mess hall should be open," he's guessing at that but hey, it's a bar; surely it's open all the time.
Location mapped, he motioned towards Tony to take the lead if he wished
to get the hell away from that 360 view.no subject
But he takes the lead when Adrien motions for him to do so. He actually manages to weave them to the bar without glancing at his own MID, almost like he's cut a path from one location to the other on at least one or two other occasions. Suspicious.
"Fortunately for all of us, that place never closes." He'd know that, too.
What a hot mess.
On the bright side, though, some of his anxiety seems to lessen the moment they're out of the observatory, and continues to bleed away as they make their way through the uniform metal hallways of the Moira. The hum of machinery is a comfort; it's expected, it's constant, it behaves in ways that are understandable. Maybe the engine room wouldn't have been a bad proposition, after all.
no subject
More like understandable, if you were someone who partook of alcohol. Adrien and Courser followed along quietly and the doctor wasn't even concerned enough to keep checking his own MID.
As they came into the bar area, he let Tony choose a seat before taking a cautious glance around and picking his own position based on which side of the genius afforded Adrien the best view of the room as a whole. Sorry Tony but Courser was coming a bit closer now, squeezing his sleek body in and under the bar stools to lay with his side against the bar rail, safely tucked out of the primary foot path but solidly wedged beneath their feet.
Leaning and arm on the bar top, when it came his time to get a drink he took only seltzer water with a lime twist.
"I hadn't been down here yet," he remarked, looking around at the space. It wasn't lost on him that there didn't appear to be any noticeable windows, leaving only the low thrum of the ship as evidence that they were not planet-side.
no subject
Tony stares at him a bit like he's said something outrageous, as he helps himself to a glass of whiskey. He knocks half of it back before even taking his seat, but once he does, his posture is immensely more at ease. Even Courser at their feet doesn't seem to perturb him.
The bar is familiar. Booze is familiar, and great at dulling his senses, besides. And Adrien's right, there's not a single window in the whole damn place. Tony couldn't be more grateful.
"I don't know if I should offer congratulations or condolences."
no subject
However, after some thought he shrugged and picked up his seltzer water.
"I'm an alcoholic, so in this instance let's go with congratulations."
Huh, easier to actually say that aloud than he'd imagined it would be. Of course, it probably helped that he'd already been sharing things with Tony that he hadn't even breathed a word of to anyone else on the ship.
no subject
Tony offers it back without batting an eye. Everyone knows he's an alcoholic back home, or at least the gossip rags do, and he's not exactly shy about hiding it. Every single space he occupies for longer than a few hours a day has a minibar in it. He's gone on extremely well-publicized drunken benders. Honestly, he should probably be more ashamed of it than he is.
But just because he's hit a point of casual acceptance, that doesn't mean this guy has.
"Uh, should we go somewhere else?"
It's not an apology, but he does sound contrite.
no subject
"Believe me, I managed to stay dry on the Neheda. This," he motioned to the bar. "Is a cake walk."
no subject
He's tempted to finish off the glass as his mind wanders in that direction, but resists the urge. He'll wait a minute or two. Only seems polite.
"So, you said 'the truth is...' and then dramatically trailed off?"
no subject
"We were discussing ... oh, right."
He finished the last of the seltzer water and reached for a re-fill. It might not be alcohol but he was hammering it back as if it were alcohol.
"Remember I mentioned the contracts had a lot of fine print? Part of that fine print was if you were ever found in breech of contract, your world, planet, whatever became forfeit and would be destroyed by the CDC.
We actually had a crew member who broke under the pressure of what we were doing and he refused to participate any longer. We were shown video of his "retirement" and execution. I can only speculate what happened to his world but given that I never witnessed the CDC issue a threat then didn't follow up on ..."
He gave his eyebrows an arch and tipped his glass slightly before he continued.
"So there is that. My home world, if it hasn't been destroyed already, is potentially under threat. I suppose it depends upon how time moves between these two dimensions and if HQ knows I'm gone.
But that's only part of it." Rubbing his hand over his face, Adrien forced himself to set the glass down and turn towards Tony.
"I mentioned that attempting to take HQ on, directly, was obvious suicide." He paused briefly, because this next bit was still speculation, he had no concrete proof, only his own read of the actions of the officers. "But there was evidence that work was being done from within to move towards resistance against what HQ was doing."
Again, he paused and actually glanced down at his MID and then around the room, before lowering his voice.
"HQ tracked, listened in and recorded everything we did. This MID? I told you about the cuff I wore with the CDC, the one that regulated my life support? Given how closely we were monitored, it was believed HQ had devices in the cuffs. Regardless, what this means is every word, every deed, every look was watched for subversive intent.
Which meant that those of us who stepped in those shadows, did so with a high level of risk. On the surface, we had to be better than best at giving HQ what they wanted, so they wouldn't look too closely.
I told you about the Almina? What got the Almina in trouble was a premature attempt to introduce a virus into the CDC HQ servers. Recently, when I was on a ... prison asteroid cluster, for lack of a better term, an Almina survivor slipped me a floppy disk, to get off the planet before it was destroyed."
Tony was a smart man, he could put that two and two together.
"Around the same time, the CDC HQ condoned the murder of one of our officers, by a young officer, completely loyal and with deep familial ties back into HQ, so she could be stationed aboard the Neheda in his place."
Just in case Tony wanted to understand why his roommate was sometimes as twitchy as a long tailed cat on a porch full of rocking chairs.
However, he realized he needed to pull some of this back to how it related to his relationship with Tony back there.
"None of us wanted to destroy planets. None of us wanted to be responsible for the annihilation of entire species, sentient or not. But those of us paying attention realized that action had to come from within and that it was going to take careful planning. You were one such individual, though believe me it wasn't easy but you saw the same game board I did and a few others.
Those of us looking for it know what was at stake, in trying to keep the crew and our home worlds safe until we could do something. And we also knew the risks we were running."
And that sort of risk under a constant fire storm? You either learned to trust one another and have one another's back or you died, quickly.
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If everything Adrien is saying is true - and Tony's inclined to believe most of it is, because this isn't the kind of shit you lie about for no reason, and he's seen enough outrageous stuff in the past two weeks that his suspension of disbelief is working overtime - then this organization is out there somewhere, with the ability to reach between universes, and knows about his planet in particular. So that's swell.
After a while, he manages what feels like a diplomatic response, all things considered.
"I'm not about to shit on you, if that's why you're justifying yourself." What would he have done in that situation? Well, he was given an answer: exactly what his other self did - play the game. Arrange a good hand. Make sure you don't lay it down until you've got blackjack.
Dammit. He chugs back half of the third drink.
"Something tells me there's no uplifting ending that you're withholding for suspense points."
cw: mention of suicidal thoughts and genocide
It was both of the man's comments that saw the doctor's lips twitch, twisting slightly into an expression that somehow, still managed to be flat. His fingers curled around his own glass, empty now though he made no move to re-fill it as he considered what he was going to say next.
"The last planet we destroyed, screamed." He began in a quiet voice. "The beings on it were called the Neraki, sentient they formed clans, had well developed orders of government and religion. They were all a part of the planet, the eco system ... the flora ... fauna."
His voice trailed off, eyes fixed on his glass but obviously far, far away.
"As we set the CTDS the planet began to cry ... mourn. There was no getting away from the sound. As we evacuated, the Neraki came to see us off. The adults ... knew but the children gave us snacks and little trinkets and mementos."
Adrien's hand clenched as he remembered the children swarming around his legs, pushing the treats on him, far away he heard glass shatter. He dropped bits of broken glass on the bar top, opening his right hand. The bandage on the already abused flesh had caught most of the glass but there were bits in his palm, which he began to pluck out.
"We had no sooner landed in the cargo bay of the Neheda when Macha was destroyed. Gone, in a matter of seconds, as if it had never existed."
Still picking out shards of glass, he finally looked over at Tony.
"I didn't tell you all that I did to keep you from shitting on me, not entirely. It was to try to explain how the version of you I knew there, how I and others, held on to our sanity in the face of that. Because you're right, there is no uplifting ending, not yet, but we were starting to fight for one."
The last words were said with a fierceness, a full belief that they had been taking the necessary steps to stop HQ and the monsters playing gods.
"Because if I didn't believe that, Tony? I would have eaten my gun after Macha." Lifting his now bloodied hand, he waggled (or perhaps the limb was trembling) his fingers at his head. "Even now, talking about it, I can still hear that planet ... screaming. Only I can't ..."
As he'd been talking, Courser had gradually grown restless and shifted from beneath the stools. The bahari had sat up and he now reared up to place his pawns on Adrien thigh. The doctor glanced down at his companion and after a moment, he lowered his injured hand, burying the bloodied fingers in the tracker's thick blue mane.
"I moved so quickly there, Tony ... there wasn't time to think or listen" to the screams of a murdered world "but it's different here. It's too quiet here."
Which was a backwards and upside down way of explaining why, particularly over the next few weeks, Tony would learn that his roommate was just as much of a work-a-holic insomniac as Stark himself. Or perhaps it was just a pre-emptive apology for the night's he'd wake up screaming.
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"Something tells me they wouldn't have made it that easy."
The words come tumbling out, morbid, flat. But he believes it, from what little he's been told. They seem like the type who'd micromanage who gets to live and who gets to die, and on what terms.
The terms being 'ours, and only ours.'
Tony thinks of Bruce and his admission the first day they'd met, of how he'd tried to but a bullet in his own mouth, and how the universe had worked against him then. Tony had told him he was alive for a reason, and believed it. He believes that's probably true in this case, too.
His eyes drift back to his glass, half-full but suddenly somewhat unpalatable.
"So don't stop moving." It's the easier answer, isn't it? It's what Tony does to get by, even if he doesn't have the weight of entire planets bearing down on his shoulders. And it works, most of the time. "Do some good in-between looking over your shoulder. Isn't that what you'd rather do?"
Maybe he's projecting too much of himself into this situation, or maybe he's not. He doesn't know Adrien that wall, after all. But he has some sneaking suspicions.
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He didn't so much forget this next bit, after all, you don't just forget but he had pushed it too the back of his mind.
"We were to submit the name of a friend, someone we trusted, to our team officers. Once we had submitted the name, we were ordered to convince them to let us kill them or get them to kill us," Adrien explained, flexing his hand as if testing for glass or perhaps pushing some of that pain deeper. "I killed my original target and had a friend, in the same team, request
begthat I kill him, rather than his having to kill."Again, he paused and picked at glass. "The friend who asked me to kill him, was a fifteen year old kid."
Just going to dig this last little bit of glass out and then start to unwind the bandage to investigate if there were any shards under there. Is it really any wonder he punched the ship's hull before this entire nightmare conversation began.
"Anyway, they were brought back to life," he wouldn't bore Tony by mentioning that first, the 'killers' had spent twenty-four hours hallucinating their targets. That had been delightful. "Hell for that matter the captain killed me once, and brought me back, so ... you're right, they tended to keep such matters on a tight leash."
Adrien ... Adrien. He looked over and then tapped his MID.
"We had just arrived on the second planet and she knew that HQ was fucking with the screw and that I was aware of some of her long term goals?" Just bring this back on track. "She called me to her rover and removed my cuff, until I died. It allowed her to make this odd, red gem stone that she then used to bring me back. That stone was designed to help bring back other dead or near dead crew members. I had one and another member of medical had one. The captain liked to think ahead."
He gave a wave of his hand, moving right along.
"I'm going to admit, Tony. There is a lot to be said for just keeping my head down and not ..." he paused and gave his head a shake. "Just keeping my head down."
The words sounded nice but would in no way reflect reality; which Tony would witness in just the next day or two.
For now, however, the doctor glanced over Tony.
"There are more delights but those are the highlights. Well there was the time I shot at someone who was stacking crates on you ..."
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"Well, lucky for you, this captaincy seems based far more on ineptitude than mustache-twirling intergalactic villainy."
He hopes that's the case, anyway. The entire premise of his kidnapping is an egg on the captains' faces - they have a gigantic magical portal built into their ship, but don't know anything about it or how it operates, let alone how to make it stop?
Tony's been furious about it for days - weeks, now - but that all seems downright benign compared to the nightmare Adrien is describing. He hates that it takes some of the edge off of his contempt for the Moira's leadership, but somehow, it does.
That last comment earns a faint twitch of his lips, a smirk-that-might-have-been. "Gee, I had no idea you cared so much."
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He ... honestly hadn't thought about it that way before. He was so used to the sharp edges that resided around the officers from the Neheda that he'd just slotted the captains of the Moira into the same levels. But now that Tony mentioned it ... huh.
It's probably pretty clear on his face that he's chewing on that remark and still it takes him a moment to shake himself clear of his inner musings to circle back on Tony's latter comment. That earned a snort out of the doctor, something that might have been a chuckle from just about anyone else.
"Eh, well." He said, using the damaged hand to make that sort of middling gesture. "I actually didn't know you that well at the time, but you were under my medical care."
He leaves it at that. As if those last four words were all he should have to say about the matter. 'Under my medical care'; Adrien would kill or die to protect his patients, just don't ask him to hold their hands or coddle them with empathy.
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"Condolences. Being my doctor is a shitty job."
It comes out dryly, but that's because he knows it's not just a joke. Tony avoids doctors as much as possible, but that's as much for their benefit as his own.
"Hopefully your patients here spend less time under piles of things."
Tony expects having this many patients around to keep busy with will do Adrien some good. If he needs to keep running, that's fine, but use the kinetic energy for something productive, something that will actually help people.