04_after | (no subject)

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oom,
trowa

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When Quatre's watch goes off, he wakes up immediately, the late evening light drifting in through the window. He'd fallen asleep on top of the covers, though he expects the workers here wash them regularly. It was as much for comfort as anything else.

He changes into the clothes the bar gave him--the same black linen pants and practical shoes as it gave him after the Cullen party, but a soft blue-grey sweater instead of a long sleeve shirt. He carefully stores his already folded business clothes in the bag, and takes it down with him to the Bar (locking the door behind him).

He drops the bag and key off at the bar, and peels the tangerine he'd picked up while sitting with Trowa and Cass, and he waits for the former.

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The tune will coalesce into something recognizable sooner or later, or it won't. Trowa's not particularly bothered, either way.

A few yards out from the door, he glances at Quatre. Where to?

"We might as well see how crowded the stables are," Quatre says, after a moment's thought.

Suits Trowa fine, and he turns his steps that way accordingly.

They seemed pretty quiet while he was out here with Cass. But someone could have spent all that time inside the barn, or just now headed there without passing through the bar. There's no reason to assume.

Quatre isn't humming; instead he's breathing lightly with a touch of uncertainty to it, as they enter the empty stables.

He follows Trowa up the ladder, one mug tucked under his arm, and sets the mugs down on a haybale.

Quatre's subtly withdrawn air could be tiredness, or a lingering bad dream, or the fact that he's still ill at ease in the new territory of the Milliways stable. All the same, he gets a glance that's somewhere between faint concern and inquiry, as Trowa sits down on a nearby bale.

There are several bales stacked together in a row here, the front rank of a stockpile that spreads to either side and rises high behind Trowa's back. Plenty of room for two.

Quatre smiles faintly at him; he hesitates, picks the mugs up again and sits down next to Trowa, though not as close as he could, offering him the mug and tangerines.

The look of concern garners another, slightly embarassed look. "Sorry," he says, quietly.

. . . Okay.

Trowa accepts the mug. And, deliberately -- after a brief invisible weighing of options, and with his own slight uncertainty better hidden -- lets his fingertips brush briefly against Quatre's wrist as he takes it.

Quatre smiles at his wrist. He uses the hand to touch Trowa's right knee and, after a moment's hesitation, lean over to kiss him lightly.

"I'm glad," he says, when he's pulled away (not completely, but enough to talk easily), "to see you."

Trowa's face has relaxed infinitesimally. You'd have to know him very well to see it, but it's still true.

"Yeah," he says.

It means, as often, me too.

Quatre relaxes, in turn, and smiles. He hesitates, for a brief moment, between kissing Trowa again and moving away; he squeezes Trowa's knee lightly and turns back so he's sitting normally. He moves, though, with the turn so that they're closer together.

He picks out one of his tangerines, and begins to unpeel it. "I liked Cassandra."

Trowa glances at him, tipping the first of his own tangerines out into his hand.

He agrees, obviously, but: oh?

"She was very friendly," Quatre explains, as he unpeels carefully (it's coming off in almost one piece).

"She clearly trusts you."

"We've been friends a while." This is agreement, not explanation; it's perfectly possible for Trowa to know somebody for years and not trust them.

It's also worth noting, though, that the number of people Trowa refers to as 'friend' is vanishingly small. Even if this is telling Quatre nothing he doesn't already know.

"A lot of people have a hard time understanding her."

Which baffles Trowa slightly -- it's not as if it's hard, so long as there aren't too many abstract concepts involved -- but he's known for a long time that most people are astoundingly unobservant. So.

"A lot of people think if you can't speak, you can't understand," Quatre says, with a slight shrug.

Mm, tangerine.

"When you went to her world, was it to help with the--ah, parapolicing?"

A lot of people think stupid things. But they knew that!

Trowa nods slightly, depositing his tangerine's peel in a more or less tidy coil on the haybale in front of them.

"She didn't need the help." Benefited from, but didn't need. "But it was informative."

Also: fun. Trowa doesn't quite bother to articulate that to himself. (Because Trowa sucks at having fun and noticing it.)

But, you know, bar brawls and rooftop acrobatics. (Bat-grapples are awesome.)

"It's non-lethal enforcement," he adds, although he doesn't expect that to come as much surprise. Quatre's met Cass, and Quatre is perceptive. And Trowa volunteered for the mission when he wasn't absolutely needed, which says things on its own. "Disable and confine for the official authorities. Gotham's got a very high level of criminal activity, from what I saw."

"Then they're lucky to have her," Quatre says, and if he sounds faintly wistful--that's because he is.

Then, slightly sheepish: "Do you mind if I switch out of English? My brain is still a little -- off. I'll try to keep to French for you."

Versus the french-arabic mixture (not exactly a creole) that tends to be used in L4.

Trowa's sidelong glance is (impassively) faintly affectionate.

"It'll be good practice," he says, which means, sure.

"You would think that," Quatre says affectionately (in French), before having another piece of tangerine. "What do you think about Gotham, and her?"

Talk, Trowa; you clearly have the brainspace to form sentences.

Well, of course he'd think that. It's the practical way to see it. (In Trowa's opinion.)

"[The technology is different,]" he says. "[More or less the 20th century. I don't know if it matches precisely.]" In French, because this might as well be practice speaking too. He needs that more than listening anyway. (Trowa's accent is good, but on certain sentences his syntax goes a little foreign.)

But, since this is talking to a genuinely bilingual friend, he'll drop into English for anything he isn't sure how to say with proper connotations in French.

"[They have people they call] metahumans. With powers. [A variety, I think. I'm not sure of the precise range. Cass's team seems to focus primarily on those criminals.]"

Quatre presses his lips against the fabric on Trowa's shoulder. "Are they metahuman also?"

Trowa shakes his head slightly. (And notes the French word for future reference.)

"[The ones that I have met don't seem to be.]"

He does need the practice; he remembers the slightly more natural way to phrase that right after he's committed to the other.

Oh well. That's what this is for.

"[Cassandra and her roommate both come here. And another friend named Steph. I think there are more, but I don't know if they come to Milliways.]"

"[Barbara Gordon is her roommate. A red-haired woman in a wheelchair.] She's a general information specialist." This has the air of a quote, for the very good reason that it is. It also has faint amusement attached, because Trowa is well aware of exactly how blandly vague a description that is. "[She seems to function as the coordination and dispatch for part or all of the team. I would guess all. If she's a metahuman, she hides it well.]" Which could be the case, of course. Trowa assesses and deduces but he tries very hard not to assume.

Assumptions get you killed. Trowa tries to avoid habits that do that.

Quatre laughs, quietly. "Maybe it's for the best that neither Une nor her daughter come here," he smiles slightly. "Either that or it's a shame."

Quatre straightens a little, to take out his handkerchief and dry off his hands of the worst of the tangerine juice. He leans back as he does so, though.

"Do you know if she's plotting anything here?"

Quatre's leaning back against the hay bales mostly, but his shoulder is a warm weight against Trowa's own. His words are a little slower, a little more deliberate, than usual; you'd have to know him well to hear the drowsiness underneath, but Trowa does.

It's faintly strange, this situation, but not unwelcome.

It's Quatre, and they're in a private place with no deadline, and Trowa can keep watch. So there's no reason to rouse him to alertness.

"[Probably in the background,]" says Trowa, who doesn't see why anyone wouldn't do so. That's what contingency plans are for. "I haven't seen signs of anything focused. [Milliways isn't the] Bats' [jurisdiction. They seem to be mostly off duty here.]"

"Hm," Quatre agrees, after a moment. "That makes sense. Do you know a Will Scarlett, here?"

"[We haven't met.]"

Which doesn't mean Trowa hasn't seen him, or heard the name. But he doesn't know much about him, and in this case he hasn't seen enough to really put name and face together.