Topic: Clarity

Mesteno · Date: 2016-01-11 16:40 EST

July, 2015

"Where does our interaction fall within your laws?" Lexius was rolling a coin across his knuckles, a trick briefly interrupted by a bold flick of shadow from his company that afternoon.

It was late July, and they?d been walking side by side in the Old Temple District, sharing secrets as they made their way towards a Norse addition to the quarter. Acquaintances of a decade or more, they?d only recently begun to keep company, trading information as much as they did history, and gradually shedding the layers of formality.

The question however was laden with it, and Mesteno, slowly acclimatising to the Elf?s rather particular nature, knew he preferred succinct answers.

"Be more precise," he?d encouraged, "Why should our interaction fall within any laws? It's...you teaching me things in return for my knowledge or insight into other things. Call it mutually beneficial. I'm not asking anything of you without payment or vice versa."

He?d read the situation wrong, but quite how badly hadn?t yet become clear.

"As you say." Just that. But the beads Lexius habitually wore, so prone to chattering had gone absolutely silent, and when the time came to part ways, the Elf had left without a farewell, disappearing between one step and the next.

Three days had passed, and though they?d not been spent idly, Mesteno had gone about his business with an air of discontent. Lexius was conspicuous by his absence, and the necromancer, in a moment of predictably drunken enlightenment had finally discovered his error one night in the middle of an alley. He?d stumbled over a trashcan as the epiphany struck, and without thought for whether it might be inconvenient to trouble Lexius at close to midnight, had exchanged the hipflask in his hand for a small crystal, one he?d seen infused with a soft lambency when Lexius had used it to contact him.

He fixed a scowl on the thing, looking for any sign of glow. "Come on, I was supposed to touch it and think elf things..." He shook it impatiently, demandingly. "I'm thinking of you. Glow!"

Lexius was alone in the middle of the desert with what seemed like a billion stars burning in the sky that stretched far and wide over the dunes. He was actually pondering the idea of Spell jamming at that moment. It was something he had never done.

He ignored the call at first, as he had ignored the Sadist's final call of his name on that day in the city when he?d turned and left, but only for a minute. Only long enough to follow that thread the crystal held back to its carrier though. Long enough to detect Mesteno was in the city not making the attempt from his home. Logic decreed he had to be in rather serious trouble, indeed, for pride to permit a call for assistance.

"What is it, Mesteno?" Calmly. And quietly, too. Almost a whisper. Just in case the Sadist was somewhere a blaring, talking rock might actually cause the situation to worsen.

"I didn't think you'd answer," Mesteno had remarked, sounding as surprised as he was pleased in that guileless way of drunks. No, definitely not in trouble. "I need you to come here. Because I can't go there, wherever you are."

Evidently it was not a conversation he wanted to have with a lump of crystal, no matter how prettily cut.

Lexius had considered cutting the connection. Curiosity prevented him from actually doing so.

Five seconds passed, and then ten, before the Elf's voice sounded again. "You can."

Mesteno was too drunk to realize what the Elf intended. Even sober he might not have put it together, because Lexius had only hinted at the fact he had this kind of power. Maybe the Elf hadn't realize he was drunk? Or maybe he had, and that was precisely the reason he did what he did.

Lexius reached out, across the hundreds of miles of distance that separated them using that crystal Mesteno touched as his connection, and he snatched the Sadist right from where he stood in that alley. The world blinked out of existence for no more than a tenth of a second. The Sadist simply ceased to exist in one place, then began again in another. In the desert with his boots buried ankle deep in sand and a view of the moon touched dunes rolling out before him like giant waves in a silvery sea.

It resulted in disorientation, and with an odd sense of momentum, as if he'd taken a step to reach the place. It also resulted in him pitching forward. Inevitably he ended up on hands and knees, the crystal skittering out of his palm to slide a few feet down the slope.

"Ass." He accused as he collected the little item up and then pocketed it. Never mind that the Elf was right there.

Mesteno · Date: 2016-01-11 16:46 EST

Despite his first word face to face being accusatory of the Elf's poor manners, Mesteno's determined frown was not aimed at Lexius. He pulled his boots loose of the sand one at a time, and managed to lurch upright, the sand hissing off his jeans, and more from his palm as he swiped it clean on one dusty thigh.

"I figured it - you - out," he declared. But he didn't sound triumphant. In fact despite the obvious effect the alcohol had made on his balance, he sounded of a rather sober mood.

Lexius had made his 'camp' where the dunes nestled around a small spring of water that just didn't seem to have any business at all being out there in the middle of such expansive tracts of sand. A single palm tree sprouted up on the far side of the water while other, smaller shrubs clung tenaciously around the rim. He didn't seem overly concerned that other creatures might wander along to come and partake of the rare resource, but he had chosen to situate himself just a little away from the pool. He'd also chosen to have Mesteno appear even farther away, just up the side of a dune, from the small ring of stones he was using like a campfire. They glowed with heat, but no flames.

Seated on a small pallet of cloth, he studied the Sadist past the rim of his coffee mug, which he drank from before deigning to answer.

"What do you think you have...figured out?" Rather impressed Mesteno hadn't lost half the liquor that was surely sloshing around in his stomach for the unexpected teleportation. Not that any of that showed on his serenely set features. He did not invite the man closer, nor did he rise to provide any assistance when Mesteno stumbled a bit. He just watched him and waited for the answer.

The significance of that distance wasn't lost on the necromancer. Obstinate, he approached anyway, not letting the lack of invitation deter him. Once he'd reached the edge of the light that spilled from that small ring of stones he did stop though, and not because it hurt his eyes. He was actually concerned he might come up against the Elf's shields, and finding that back in place, so obviously designed to illustrate the shift in dynamics... well he wasn't eager to experience it.

"I figured out why you did one of your vanishing acts on me the other day." No delicate preamble, only the typical straight-talk he seemed so fond of. His expression was one of determined, fierce concentration, because he hadn't given himself time to consider words before getting himself hauled out into the desert, and there was a rather large risk he might fuck things up further. "I told you to be precise about what you wanted to know. You didn't correct me when you let me assume you meant the nature of our learnin'. Sometimes, a guy just needs to hear it in plain common."

There was a tan colored backpack watching Mesteno (no, no, it didn't have eyes. Just a trick of the strange rock light. Or too much alcohol) from where it was slumped off to the side and just behind the Elf's little pallet. And the beads were there, of course, coiled beside Lexius' leg, half on the cloth and half in the sand stretched out like a lumpy little snake.

Lexius did not prevent Mesteno from coming closer, but it was probably best the Sadist had stopped where he did. It was, after all, the appropriate span of distance. He didn't quite frown, but the serenity of his expression did deepen a fraction more for the words.

"Hear what?" He asked patiently. He had been precise. As Mesteno had been in his answer. The nature of their learning was the very heart of the interaction. And all there was to it, according to what the Sadist had said. Had the guy really contacted him to go over this again? Suddenly, the Elf's eyes were glinting a little more brightly...as if he might be about to send Mesteno right on back to where he'd taken him from!

Mesteno scowled at him. Outright scowled! Because maybe the way Lexius had phrased it back in the Temple District had been a good, cautious way. One that didn't sound uncomfortably soft.

"Quit that and give me a second," he growled, though it was half-hearted. He knew when the Elf's eyes glinted that way, that it was usually a pre-cursor to him performing some psionic feat. And he didn't want to end up back in the alley cursing himself for not fixing things.

He sat down abruptly, still just beyond the edge of the light, and with the sand slithering about under him all hiss and whisper.

"Hear what I actually thought of you. Sure, I stated our interactions, but that doesn't touch on other shit. Like the fact you're my friend. At least, I'm your friend, and if you're mine I'd kinda like that but I think you're pissed right now." In retrospect he should probably have waited until he wasn't all liquored up to try and fix it. His impulsiveness was often his own worst enemy. He levelled a tired look at him, before sighing out, "Look, don't send me back just yet. I'm not good at this shit. Guys just usually know when they're buddies without asking, so I'm rusty."

Lexius...frowned. But at least that glint in his eyes settled down some. It almost hadn't simply for the fact Mesteno had told him to quit. But the man got in enough other words before the Elf could completely bend his Will to the task of another teleportation. Words that put pause to the act and drew that frown to his lips. He drowned it in another slow drink of coffee before he set the mug aside. He was silent for some span of time, mulling what the man had said and what he actually meant. It was somewhat muddled to the Elf, not only due to Mesteno's intoxicated state.

"You wish to redefine the parameters of our association?" He finally asked. The Elf was rather good at compartmentalizing people. But he knew he lacked certain skills when those divisions began to overlap. As they had begun to with the Sadist. Mesteno wasn't the only one bad at that sort of thing.

Mesteno · Date: 2016-01-11 16:55 EST

The beads began to slither, leaving little 's' marks in the sand as they rounded the ring of stones on their way toward the Sadist.

Mesteno?s fingers had gone straying, quite out of habit, back to the dented, pewter flask at his hip. He might even have resumed his drinking if he hadn't spied those beads side-winding across the sand, avoidant of the ring of stones. They'd never quite been that blatant before!

"Do I wish to wh-- Wait. Yes. Yes I do." He'd thought he'd been clear enough, but he was beginning to think that Lexius needed to hear a specific string of words in order to be satisfied he meant what he said. So he made no comment on the beads, and would not until they'd finished their little clarification session. Unless they touched him, in which case he was sure something terrible was going to happen. It was like waiting to be bitten by a snake!

"You tell me how you'd define them," he encouraged. "And this time, I won't talk until you're done in case I don't understand again."

That frown on the Elf's lips lingered. He didn't seem aware that his beads were straying...or he simply knew to try and stop them would be a futile effort. The beads stopped on their own, coiling around and around themselves into something of a circle. Something reminiscent of that snake Mesteno had likened them to in his thoughts. There they lurked, as if poised to strike, with no warning rattle or obvious fangs.

Again Lexius let silence be in his only answer for a long, long while as he watched Mesteno across that glowing pit of stones. Their light was steady and even, not too terribly bright, but enough to illuminate those waiting beads and the expressions on the Elf's angled features. Was that a scowl now?! No, no. It was gone. And Lexius spoke.

"The story I told you....none know so much of me. It is not a thing I would share as just part of a bargain." Koyan had known the most, but even he had not gotten the detail the Sadist had. "Nor is it something I would explain to someone I consider only a student. But I am uncertain if you understand that."

Mesteno had the distinct feeling that the beads were waiting for him to fuck up, to wreak some havoc if he somehow further upset their precious Elf. Maybe that was why he snorted quietly at the way they coiled up there, serpentine and ominous. "Nolite solliciti," he murmured at them, though he'd no notion of whether they'd understand his words.

Lexius was staring at him though, and he lifted his eyes to stare right back, watching him above the peak of the flames with a slow blink his only action. It appeared he was going to give him all the time he needed to find his voice. He wasn't disappointed, even when he saw the scowl because... well how often did anything break that serenity? It was something he could read!

"I understand that," he told the Elf quietly, moving at last, but only to rest an elbow on a knee. "And I was... humbled when you told me, t'be frank with you. I know how tight lipped you are. I know that I'm like you, not the old you, either, this time. Like current you. The past isn't something I speak of much. Y'have to know the other person's more'n gonna keep their mouth shut. You gotta trust them to recognise it's the making of you, every dirty little mistake, every choice you made that might make someone think differently of you." There was a risk to it, was what he was saying. "I'm glad you consider me more than a student," he admitted at the last.

There was an intentness to Lexius? gaze that implied he was picking apart every little nuance of language (both body and verbal) and tone that the Sadist expressed as he spoke. Finally, he gave a single nod. "Just so."

Breaking his still and disconcerting study of the man, Lexius reached for his coffee mug again as he continued. "I have proven to be....less than skilled in the art of interpersonal interactions. When they involve myself, at least." He made the admission blandly enough. So blandly one wouldn't think he was the one that had so effortlessly and completely destroyed nearly every single relationship he'd ever had. "I simply sought to clarify your understanding." A pause, and then he added. "And that it is mutual."

Mesteno seemed to relax a little - or a lot, since the alcohol had a habit of turning his bones to water - and with Lexius' two-word acceptance of his confession, he let the focus of sharp eyes skip aside to the fire. Throughout the whole of that little speech they'd remained honest and open on Lexius.

"You make it sound like y'skilled at telling other people what they ought t'do," he remarked, and there was just a touch of hesitant humour there, as if he were easing back into his usual, too-bold skin little by little. "But don't worry, I'm kinda persistent once I like a person. You'll have to work hard to offend me. I'm not what you'd call a high maintenance friend."

Mesteno · Date: 2016-01-11 16:58 EST

From the fire to the beads his eyes slipped, and he sank forwards, rearranging his legs so they were crossed, elbows to either thigh. "Your beads seem to have migratory tendencies," he pointed out. "If I pick them up, will they break my fingers?"

The Elf drank deeply from that mug he held, draining it empty before he set aside the mug and made a small gesture with one hand. That pack behind him suddenly crawled forward, using its straps as legs to shuffle across the sands. "You require water." He advised calmly before he addressed the Sadist's observation. So he was procuring a cup from the bag which flipped its flap open on its own like a well-trained pet. The skin came next. And he poured and sent that cup floating Mesteno's way before he spoke again. Water from his own hand!

"I spent the bulk of my existence advising others. It was, in fact, what I was trained to do. But it is not something I have been able to accurately use on myself." As for the beads? He eyed them himself. They were lax. Just waiting for that moment of distraction when Mesteno wasn't looking to leap forward to wind around that flask the Sadist carried at his hip. "They may not co-operate."

It wasn't the first time Lexius had shared water with Mesteno, but having it poured for him as if the Elf were his host was worthy of a dip of his head and a murmur of "Multas gratias," as he reached for the floating cup. There was a slight waver to his hands, as if his coordination were not at its finest, but he didn't miss on the first attempt, either.

The leaping beads very nearly made him spill it, but he skimmed a hand under the cup to keep any fluid from being wasted in the sand (never mind they were right by a spring) and peered down at where they'd coiled about his flask. "I think they may disapprove of my vice," he remarked, as if it weren't obvious. He wasn't oblivious as to why Lexius insisted he drink, either. It wasn't like there was a burning desert heat to contend with currently. Just dehydration thanks to the liquor!

"There's a world of difference between instructing someone 'bout customs, psionic talents, culture, warfare..." he dared to slip a hand down and touch the tip of one index finger harmlessly to the back of a bead. "...and personal shit. And from what you've mentioned about your beginnings, I'm guessing you maybe didn't have all the right opportunities to learn the way most kids and young adults do."

Lexius was just as surprised by the beads if the way his eyebrows twitched up was any indication. They had coiled themselves fully around the flask with surprising speed, but they just wrapped there unmoving when Mesteno reached down to poke at them. They felt like...wooden beads, and did not move so much as a millimeter for the touch.

"They may simply be curious." Lexius finally mused, and gave a low hum of agreement for the rest of Mesteno's commentary without further belaboring the point. He had the right of it. One would think the Elf had learned something more about how to apply such principles to himself in all the time he'd lived. But he really hadn't.

"Could be," he agreed, but he didn't sound particularly convinced. He made no attempt to remove them though, and sipped from his cup of water as much to placate the imagined disapproval of them, as to keep himself from dehydrating and waking up with a hangover the following day.

They spoke at length, and Mesteno could've quite happily fallen asleep right there with his arm for a pillow had it not been for the chill. With that fire putting out so little heat, he'd probably have woken up as frozen as if he'd been walking in the Shadowlands. He counted to three in his head, pulling together some coordination to sit up with a grunt, the sand spilling from hair and clothes.

"I should go," he admitted quietly, pausing only to finish off the water. He'd not waste any for risk of seeming ungrateful for such a precious commodity. "Just wait a second." For him to make it to his feet. He didn't want Lexius sending him back to where he'd stumbled over the trashcan whilst sitting. He'd be waist deep in refuse! More hissing sand, but he didn't bother to dust it from clothes or skin. Instead he faced the Elf as sandy as said Elf usually looked to him! "Gratias. For giving me a chance." Quietly offered once he was ready. The addition in case the thanks needed clarifying.

Lexius watched as the Sadist pulled himself together, stood himself up. That vague smile on his lips was for the precaution he took by asking Lexius to wait (smart man!) until he was ready before porting him away. He said nothing, at first, for the thanks. And continued to sit right where he was for a short span of silence before he offered a reply.

"I rather think you took it." And that seemed to please him. "There is a thing I wish to show you in the city next time I am there. Until then. Vale, Mesteno." Then came the teleportation, swift and accurate. But he didn't put Mesteno back in that alley. Instead, he sent him back home.