nevermorethroppish

A meeting

It's not often that he gets visitors these days. His daughter only visits when she needs a place to hide for a while and he'll always provide it; he'd told her since she'd walked out the door that she could always walk back through it. Erik, on the other hand, hasn't been up in ages and Liir's neck is probably less sore because of it; they'd never much gotten along even if the two of them agreed on more than they didn't. But he comes today, someone new in tow, and Liir starts the creaky old engine of hospitality up once more if only out of necessity.

As Erik makes introductions, they don't talk much. They don't say much of anything as he leaves either. But once he's actually gone, Liir gestures to the most comfortable spot in the small cabin that he makes his home in for Scott to take as he likes.

"Have you eaten? Prison's a hungry business from what I remember of it."

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Scott flinches at the touch, even asleep. He doesn't even initially seem prepared to accept anything, though of course he does.

But once things start to settle at all, he does, in a very, very easy way. Soaks it all in like a sponge and there's something familiar enough about it that he actually unwinds from his position, stretches and moves just enough to be in contact with the person in bed with him.

Then he does sleep - and continues to sleep through until just pre-dawn, when he wakes up properly, and -

Gets to work. On anything he can come up with to do.

Liir wakes after him, at dawn, content to let nature tell him when he ought to sleep and when he ought to wake up. All the same, there's plenty of things to do at the house.

Neatening, organizing; Liir's cleaning is simple and functional, but he's fallen past the exacting military corners and white glove dustings that he'd once done. Not to mention a washer with a bit of a leak, a dryer whose steam release has slipped a little out of place, and a stove that could do with a bit of cleaning.

He takes the time to dress and groom himself, read over a couple of things, and only then does he emerge. Then hens will provide them some eggs, which is why he goes out the back to get them before heading for the kitchen.

By the time he goes out to get the eggs, Scott's cleaned back to near military corners and white glove precision. He's also straightened everything, cleaned the hell out of the stove and is busy investigating the washer.

He washes his hands when Liir comes back in, though. "Good morning."

"Morning," since he's never been the sort to assign such things good or bad till he's been at them for a while. "Over easy, sunny, or scrambled?"

That, a hunk of hard cheese and some crusty bread from the day before with an ungodly amount of butter will be breakfast. Hopefully, Scott's hungry again. Liir certainly is.

"You remember me telling you that I don't have real food preferences, right?" There's a smile to go with it, but he truly does not care. He will eat what's there.

And, yes, he's hungry again. He's going to be for a while. He has some weight to gain back. If he's not careful, he'll just get fat. Or would with less activity than he's going to be doing.

"Lucky you. Over easy is the only one I'm not rubbish at," he answers as he starts in on the cooking. That had been the way Cherrystone like them so it's the only way he's ever really had to learn to cook them. He'd learned to like them that way just for expediency's sake.

Auntie Witch had liked them scrambled, but she also hadn't tasted anything so there hadn't been much need to worry about it.

The plate is served up quickly enough since they don't take that long to cook and Liir takes a little more time, dipping the toast into the egg yellow, lingering.

Scott takes his plate with him and effectively manages to eat while he finishes the washer and then takes care of the dryer hose.

After which he does a decent job of scrubbing the kitchen again.

"Did you pick this place as somewhere to stay?"

"No," he admits in between bites. "Erik did that." He tips his chin towards the washer. "I would have been satisfied with much less. I didn't even know half of these things existed until I came here. I figured them out on my own."

Erik's idea of a little joke. Really, their relationship is such a gas.

"...You can leave here, if you want, can't you?"

Dammit, Erik, don't make him kill you. Because he's in a murder the world kind of mood right now.

It's clear from the expression on his face that he doesn't quite understand how they got from A to B, but all the same, his hand reaches out.

While Scott was cleaning, he would have found two brooms: one in a modern style, with plastic bristles, and another built like something in a fairy tale, a long piece of wood with cut and dried grasses tied to the end. It's the second one which comes to his hand before he lays it against the breakfast counter.

"I can go wherever I like whenever I like. I've even got funds of my own since the accounting I mentioned is actually quite lucrative. Especially when you don't skim off the top and that reputation proceeds you."

He tips his chin towards the door.

"There's only one person in this world who matters. And when she comes through the door, I want there to be someone to welcome her."

He loves her, even though they're both bad at it. And she might not come often, but he's earned that, no matter what his intentions were.

"Erik and I have a long and not entirely pleasant history," he is all he says, by way of explaining why he questioned just what the hell Erik was doing with Liir. Whether he could leave, whether there was something truly nefarious happening.

He can't say there's one person in this world who matters. The world matters. The world matters more than any of them and he wonders if Rain would appreciate her father more if she spent time with Nathan. Hypothetical of course. He's earned his son's absence, too.

Yesterday, he wondered where Nathan was. Today, he assumes he knows.

"How much did he tell you about me?"

"I could say the same." After all, he had mentioned the frequent death threats, yes? And the arguments? The fact that it was an arrangement as opposed to anything more personal?

And sad to say, he would agree with Scott. He'd lived that concept and died that concept and lived again only after he'd made the point about that concept to those who would not listen, those who in their desperation for power or resources or whatever it was that filled their mad little minds, had sacrificed all manner of lives and pain and horrors for it. Of course, they'd sacrificed other people's lives and pain and horrors, which was why they'd been so ready to. He'd only ever had himself and those he loved and he'd lost all of those but Rain, who occasionally wandered back where her mother and Trism had never once darkened his doorstep since he'd seen them last.

He stays there for Rain for the same reason that he had refused the Grimmerie: he has seen what he can do when he has a goal and a purpose and a driving need.

He can smell it any time there's no cigarillo in the ash tray.

"You heard everything he said. That's all I've gotten from him." A pause before- "But I do have the internet. And while I may be a fool, I'm not a blind one. Ask what you'd like to ask."

"I don't actually have anything that I need to ask." Not if he was aware of Scott's identity, and what he'd done . There were other circumstances that might be relevant but those were defenses and he wasn't interested in defending himself. "I just wanted to know."

Which was - dead on true, if somewhat tired. Though - "I doubt that I will be here for long." It was meant to be reassuring. He wouldn't be in Liir's hair for longer than he needed to be, to recover. How long that took - Well, time would tell but it would be some.

"Everyone leaves. I didn't expect it would be any different this time," which was said matter-of-factly. There was no malice, nothing passive aggressive. But he hadn't made his comment the other day idly. He was a solitary man, but never by choice.

That was a reason he stayed here too.

"I'm going to go out and collect the rest of the eggs. Tend the garden. Do you know how to hunt? Farm?"

That answer surprised him. It was also telling and it wrenched something in his chest - hard. "The only thing I know how to do is be a soldier and fight, but if you tell me what needs done, I will do it."

"I'll show you the garden once I've brought in some of the eggs," he said simply enough, "and tomorrow, I'll show you hunting. I've been a soldier before. And a former soldier."

He knows how to survive the emptiness after. And how to fill it with enough to keep going.

"I'll finish your washer and dryer." Those things are things he knows how to do. He can do and keep himself busy with them and figure out the garden and he can probably work out hunting without much trouble.

That he's killed people should help, though god knows he's resisted killing animals before. He didn't need them to eat, then.

"If you like." He likes the tik toks but he still knows how to work around them if they don't work. They break often enough and Erik usually doesn't find out until he comes to visit because Liir's never been one to fuss. "I've got a wash board and a tub if need be."

A pause as he realizes how that might sound.

"Though I appreciate it. I've just never had a way with tik tokery."

"Those are terrible for your clothes," he murmurs, almost absently. He isn't thrown by Liir's vocabulary, much, but -

"What was the place you're from like?"

"What's any place like?" he offers in reply. "Much like this one in most ways. Entirely unlike it in others. People are people are people, as horrible and glorious as they ever are. Where I'm from, some of them have hooves or scales or fur. Here, some of them wear glasses or make themselves look like anyone they like or move around metal with their thoughts instead of their hands. There's always a reason."

He pulls a basket from a corner for the eggs.

"Children become soldiers become corpses. Or people like us, which may be even worse."

A flicker of a hollow smile.

"Tik toks are considered sinful by some, where I'm from. Anything mechanical. Technological. Personally, I think the Unnamed God has bigger things to take umbrage with, but He's never consulted with me."

He opens the back door from the kitchen.

"I'll be back in a moment."

There were a few things in there he would have gotten angry about - but none of them involved him or defense of himself, and the anger was more about the truth in all those words than the opposite.

So he basically grunted a reply and went to work on the machines. "If I'm going to hell," he said, basically to no one, "It'll be for better reasons than fixing machinery."

He'd be finished properly by the time Liir made it back in.

Liir came back with a basket full of eggs and a chicken draped over the lot of them. The creature hadn't expired naturally, as the angle of it's neck shows, but it hadn't laid for long enough that Liir had decided to make the bird useful again as only a farmer could.

"No hunting today," he said as he slipped into the kitchen. "Though I can show you how to clean a chicken at least."

He's a little disturbed by the lifeless bird, but it doesn't show. "It's your home and your schedule. Teach me what you want, when you want, if you want. Just tell me what I need to be doing or where I need to be."

He's there, he'll watch, he'll learn. He'd still rather get his chicken in plastic wrap or out of a garbage can.

"You need things to do," he says in reply, "as there's not much out here. Learning is a thing to do."

He starts sorting, putting the eggs in a little holder in the makeshift pantry; the chicken he leaves out on the main counter.

"Though if you've no stomach for this kind of work, I won't blame you. You can learn to milk the goat instead."

"My stomach's fine, thanks." He's managed to do worse things than gut a chicken. Does it bother him? Yes. A lot as it turns out? Will it stop him? Hell no. "Show me what to do, and let's get it done."

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