Open 'verse RP [Open -- Separate threads fine]

[changehistory]

He'd come home out of some weird need to find his roots, again. Or something. At the current moment he couldn't remember. Souvenir shops lined the streets he roamed too long ago. The house had burned over three centuries before and even the alleys were swept now. There had been nothing to bury, and no money for more than a mass grave had there been, so there were no markers, nothing to see, nothing to kneel at.

Wandering into the new St. Paul's, built after he left, after the fire that took them, he nonetheless felt something settle. He sat in a pew for hours, trying to remember what it had felt like when he came home, saw this, sat here the first time, a different man. Not Matthew. Not Takezo Kensei. Something else, someone else. A man without country, time, family.

For a time, he'd thought to find it again, but now the dream seemed farther away than it had even when trapped in that cell, and he was cold.

It was well after dusk when he left. He found a pub, a table in a corner, and with a wry smile that cursed all the years in between, he ordered a whiskey and asked the bartender to leave the bottle, working to bury himself in the one thing left that had any familiarity or link to the old.

Comments

[powered-otaku.livejournal.com]

*There's a snort behind him as he's drinking.*

Where's a horse trough when you need one?

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

Adam doesn't even bother to look up. "If you consider it, I will hurt you, carp."

[powered-otaku.livejournal.com]

"As opposed to drowning yourself from the inside?" Hiro comes up to the bar. "Why are you doing this?"

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

"I had a bad day." Adam drains the whiskey in his glass and pours another. "A bad week? Year? Decade? Three decades? I think I've earned it."

[powered-otaku.livejournal.com]

"You have had many bad days. Since I have seen you now, you have not done this much drinking. What happened?" Hiro picks up the bottle and asks for a shotglass.

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

"It all piled up," Adam said, unwilling to mention Nathan. He had promised, both Angela and Nathan and it was all too complicated. "I've been talking to an old friend...memories of a better time, when I thought everything was going to be all right."

[powered-otaku.livejournal.com]

Hiro is looking at him. "It can't be someone from too long ago." He fills the shotglass, mumbles "Kampai" and slams it back. "Is this friend one of the ones who incarcerated you?"

[onlysayinghello.livejournal.com]

Stepping out of the bathroom after his shower Jack had redressed and was looking to find Adam to ask him if he wanted to do anything that evening, but was a bit surprised to find the room empty. Rubbing his hand to his chin, Jack let his fingertips brush against his lips trying not to over think it all, but still it did give him a bit of concern. Still Jack had faith that he'd return and so Jack took the chance to catch up with some things still leftover from work.

When dusk came though, concern grew into worry and Jack shut his computer off and headed out into the cold to try and see if he could figure out a path of least resistance for the man he'd only started to get to know. A few cheap shots in the dark landed him in a few random places around the smaller city, and finally he settled on a local pub where he spotted Adam in a dark corner keeping a bottle of whiskey company.

"Find what you were looking for?" Jack asked in earnest.

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

Adam looked up, blinked, then frowned looking back down. "No. Not really. I think whatever I was looking for has been gone for a very long time."

The whiskey glass was empty, so he reached for the bottle, pouring another glass.

"Care to join me?"

[onlysayinghello.livejournal.com]

Jack sighed softly almost knowing exactly the sentiment behind the words. He had a sudden feeling of deja vu, having been here with another man... on so far away from a time that he could call his own that in end he felt death was the only way out of it all. That way out wasn't an option for men like Adam and him though... there was no way out of the emptiness.

Nodding in reply to the question of company Jack shifted to sit at the table with Adam taking the glass that had been poured for him. His fingers held it lightly bringing it up to his nose to smell it a reassuring smirk gracing his features for a moment, "Good year."

Taking a careful sip he set the glass back down and eased into a bit more comfortable position at the table, "Are you okay? I mean, it sounds like a stupid question I'm sure, but I have to tell you that I was worried a bit."

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

"I'm sorry," Adam said softly. "I should have left a note. I didn't expect to be out for so long, and once I was, I just didn't think."

He sipped at the whiskey, frowning a bit as he turned the glass in his hand over and over again. Everything seemed flat from where he'd tried so hard to pull it all together. There was no purpose, since he'd failed, and he was forced to face that so much had turned, so much had gone wrong.

So many people he cared for, or had once, had turned their backs on him and he was truly out in the cold. Not alone, he reminded himself, looking over at Jack, but it was so new it was hard to allow it to comfort the holes that seemed to have been punched so deep in his soul.

"I'll be all right," he said, trying to put some conviction in his voice. "Eventually."

[onlysayinghello.livejournal.com]

Taking another sip Jack shook his head, "Things come up, it happens. We're not joined at the hip, if you need space don't ever feel that you have to apologize for it."

Glancing around the bar he smiled lightly, "Still of all the places for you to end up at the end of the night, this one is a nice one."

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

"I didn't want to worry you, though," Adam said with a smile that didn't quite meet his eyes.

He glanced around the bar, as if taking it in for the first time. "I suppose it is. I just...it looked warm and it had alcohol, and both of those sounded like a good combination."

[thisway-comes.livejournal.com]

"I realise I shouldn't be surprised in the least, considering how alike in tastes and attitudes we seem to be..."

The Rani dropped into the other chair at the table, across from Adam, an eyebrow arched and a bemused expression on her face, setting down a glass of brandy as she settled in.

"But this is beginning to border on a vague sort of stalking, you turning up in the pub I like so much in this part of the city. Are you here to test my willpower again?"

She glanced across at him, but when his gaze met hers, she dropped the teasing in favour of a more appraising look, and a frown. "Are you all right?"

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

Adam glanced up, surprised at the familiar voice in such an unfamiliar place. He half stood, out of habit, then sank back down in the chair, processing that she was there.

"I..." He was thrown, and he didn't like it, well aware of the whiskey he'd consumed. "I am all right, thank you. A bit...I grew up here. In this part of the city."

[thisway-comes.livejournal.com]

She inclined her head slightly, acknowledging his respectful gesture as he settled back into his own chair, her face betraying none of the enjoyment she got out of catching him so far off his guard.

"I do see. I also daresay, were I to go back to the spot where I grew up, I might want to drown my sorrows in a bottle afterwards as well," she remarked, canting her head at the whiskey. She took a sip of her brandy, then leaned back in her chair, getting comfortable. "Did you come just to reminisce?"

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

"I don't know why I came," he said truthfully, leaning back some in his chair to study her in return, though his gaze was a little less soul-probing sharp than usual. "Perhaps going back to the beginning to see where I went wrong to get to where I am now."

[thisway-comes.livejournal.com]

The candor was unexpected, and she blinked, both her eyebrows going up. "I didn't realise you were displeased with where you are now, Adam."

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

"Ah, well. It is better than where I was two months ago, but it is nowhere near where I hoped to be."

[enjoythe_ride]

It was late by the time Bela wandered in, much in need of a good stiff drink. She hated coming back to England. It brought back memories of a life that she didn't live anymore, and if her client wasn't so damn insistent, she would have never taken the job to begin with. But she did, and it was done, so she was entertaining the idea of drinking herself blind and seeing where the night took her.

By the time she got to the bar, though, and saw the familiar face next to her, she abandoned the idea of getting plastered, just for a moment, and instead let the tips of her fingers wrap around the neck of the bottle and spin the label around to face her so that she could see what he was drinking. She raised an eyebrow slightly before speaking up.

"Good year."

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

Adam looked up, surprised to see her there. He was surprised to see anyone, really, in a place where he knew no one anymore, where everything had changed so much. But it wasn't unwelcome.

"Bela..." He straightened a bit, glad the whiskey hadn't taken him so far away yet that he was unable to smile with something like sobriety remaining. He glanced at the whiskey. "Was it? I find I'm lamentably lacking in such knowledge lately. But I asked the bartender for his best."

He nodded to the other chair at the table. "Care to help me finish it?"

[enjoythe_ride]

"Love to," she said with a smile. "Just one moment."

She made her way to the bar and got herself a glass before returning to the table and pouring herself a glass of her own. She took a sip and let it burn down her throat before responding.

"I have no idea of it truly was a good year," she sighed. "But it definitely was a good year for whiskey."

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

He gave a wry chuckle and dipped his head in a silent nod of acknowledgment. "It was at that. Then again, properly aged, I have never actually met a whiskey I didn't at least give a friendly nod to."

He leaned back in his chair and studied her much as he had the night they met. "I'm surprised to see you in London."

[enjoythe_ride]

"As am I," she sighed, taking another sip. "But my buyer was very insistent that I take this job, and I am never one to turn him down. I plan on leaving as soon as humanly possible."

She hesitated for a moment, tilting her head to the side slightly, as she placed the glass down, spinning it in her fingers. "Do you still want me to go to Japan?"

[changehistory.livejournal.com]

"Is the job confidential?" he asked, curious. "I mean, I assume the buyer is, but the job itself?"

He smiled, just a little, letting her distract him from his own thoughts. "I do, yes. More than ever, really." Considering how badly things had gone since last they met.