Logs:Guileless

Guileless
Dramatis Personae Lucien, Matt, Tony
In Absentia	2021-01-10 "What a pleasant surprise!"
Location <PRV> Tessier Residence - Greenwich Village
Understated opulence claims this spacious and well-kept townhome, the decor throughout the whole of it of the highest quality and carefully chosen. The front door opens onto the entrance hall, a closet close at hand to receive coats and shoes -- the pale hardwood floors gleam underfoot, unsullied by tracked-in mess from outside. The living room beyond the entrance is all dark woods and pale earth tones, comfortable couches and armchairs and a thick soft rug laid down beneath. Two large and painstakingly aquascaped aquariums flank the entrance to the dining room, with several brightly coloured species of fish within. Most of the rest of the wall space, notably, is taken up with shelves -- shelves crammed with books of every subject and genre. A study branching off of the main hall is cozy, small, done in pale blues and lined with books as well around the large computer desk and smaller futon, though these rarer books are cased behind glass. Another securely locked door leads to the basement, and another to the full bathroom downstairs. The kitchen connects to the living room; in contrast, it is sleek and modern and well-appointed, stocked by someone who takes their cooking seriously. And takes their alcohol equally seriously -- to one side of the kitchen there is a fully-stocked bar. The back door to the kitchen looks out on a small well-kept garden. RAT-TAT-TAT-'TAT'. The knocks on the Tessier's front door Sunday afternoon are sharp and quick and unannounced. Outside it's grey but mild; on the doorstep Tony is in only jeans, a leather jacket unbuttoned over a lightweight grey sweater. He has a cup of coffee in one hand, and is just crumpling the wrapper of a bacon egg and cheese sandwich into his palm as he devours the last bite and licks the corner of his mouth clean. It's a few moments' delay before the door opens. Matt is standing upright but leaning hard on the door frame in a black tee shirt with a blue graphic of a house, a staircase spiraling deep into the earth below, and ancient tattered blue jeans. He's pale and skinny, though no longer skeletal, looking a bit disheveled even with a clean-shaven face and hair still much too short to muss. His bright green eyes blink, friendly if uncomprehending, but his smile comes easily enough. "Mister Stark," he says as he steps back to gesture the guest inside and keep the slim black-and-tan mutt beside him from bounding out, "what a pleasant surprise! Please, come in." Tony blinks. The crumpled wrapper drops from his hand; he does not pick it back up. His eyes have been somewhere a few inches above Matt's head; they tick down to his face, back up, back down. "Huh. Not what I expected." He's taking a sip of his coffee as he steps inside, sweeping the house now with an appraising glance. "And -- what I expected." He's just a little more clipped with he turns back to Matt, a more brittle edge to his not-quite-smile. "Your brother. He in?" Matt's eyes track the wrapper briefly, one of his eyebrows dipping though he does not comment. "What *were* you expecting?" he asks, more curious than challenging. As he closes the door behind Tony he adds, "Oh, and take off your shoes, if you please. I'd offer you something to drink, but you seem--adequately supplied." He leans against the back of the nearest armchair and fishes his phone from his pocket, "He's working, but I'll let him know you're here." He continues speaking as he swipes out a text, "Care to have a seat, meanwhile?" (Matt --> Luci): Tony Stark is here to see you, apparently. "Thought you'd be --" Somewhere between the request to remove his shoes and Matt texting Lucien Tony seems just a little distracted, a frown crossing his face before his next swig of coffee. "Taller." His fingers drum restlessly against the side of the cup, and he paces past Matt into the living room, starting to scan the books on the shelves with a furrow of brows that starts small but only grows. "Tweedier." Lucien slips quietly out of the study, shutting the door softly again behind him. Only slightly less casual than the others, he is in camel twill trousers paired with a hunter green angora v-neck sweater over a cream-colored button-down. The intricate chemistry of his mind has been fairly relaxed today but coils tenser as he emerges, pausing in the doorway to look toward Tony with a discomfort that registers plain across the surface of his mind and not at all in the polite-neutral cast of his expression. "Well, Mister Stark, this is a surprise. I am due at the Club later this evening, though certainly if your business is so pressing that you could not wait until then to avail yourself of my services --" His brows lift, expectant. "Sorry I could not oblige, but I'm frankly startled you had any expectations whatsoever about me." Matt's eyes narrow ever so slightly when Tony ignores his instruction. The armchair nearer to the fireplace is ringed with the detritus of Matt's own work--laptop, binder, and a copy of Matthias Gardell's Gods of the Blood: The Pagan Revival and White Separatism, bristling with colorful marker tabs. Lucien can sense the surge of his anger even as his power coils tighter, reassuring, but the warmth in his expression likewise remains. "Pardon, Mister Stark," he chimes sweetly, though a flinty edge creeps into his voice towards the end of the sentence, "I asked you to take off your shoes." Tony is just reaching to pluck a book off the shelf -- Recall: The Neuroscience of Memory by Dr. Rasheed Toure. He glances up from flipping it open at Matt's reiterated request, a brief confusion crossing his expression that only grows when he looks to Lucien. "I, ah, don't. Require. Any servicing." He starts to put his coffee down on a bookshelf, starts to lift one leg as if he's about to remove a shoe but then just straightens again. Plucks his coffee back up. He's still holding the book when he crosses back to the living room entrance. "Right. The Club. Haven't -- stopped in lately. Should catch you there." Lucien's head dips as he steps forward, reaching to pluck the book gently from Tony's hand. "If it has been a while, perhaps you have forgotten that their library is quite extensive." The agitation roiling in his mind prickles sharper against Matt's awareness. Where Matt's power coils through his and extends his reach, his senses flicker out briefly over Tony and then quickly away in something like alarm. He folds the book into his arms, wrapping it against his chest. Only a touch softer, taking a half-step back towards his brother: "This is the wrong Tony Stark." Matt tries to soothe the agitation away, though he seems well enough aware that will only get him so far. His own anger only swells, and it seems very likely he is actually about to snap when his brother's words stop him short. Bewilderment floods him and actually overwhelms his placid, amicable expression. "{What?}" he blurts. His power shifts its augmenting subtly, bolstering strength and range both as he takes a step toward Lucien, though his eyes remain fixed on Tony. "Who are you, then?" Tony looks down for a moment at his empty hand. Then back up at Matt with a quick blink, a slight narrowing of his eyes before his attention shifts back to Lucien. "-- Assumed you knew. Knowing everything is." His eyes flick between the two, quick. "Kinda your thing. Impression I got. Maybe mistaken." The breath he huffs out is a little dismissive. "You considered it's the world that's wrong?" His fingers are drumming, again, against the cup. "Figured you for a useful guy to know in it." The roiling does not quite stop, but it does settle into a lower simmer. "I am paid to know a few things." Lucien grips the book tighter, his other hand brushing fingers slowly up and down against the sleeve of his sweater. "Pardon?" His eyes have gone slightly wider. "How did you manage to get trapped here, you were meant to be operating -- you could not have just --" There are several overlapping contortions taking place in his mind that suddenly snap into some semblance of order as his eyes lock back on Tony. "Why?" "There's always plenty wrong with the world," Matt says, quiet and circumspect, "but I suppose that bounty has been overflowing of late." His shock doesn't show on his face this time, though Lucien can feel it, and the flex of his power questing for DJ in the basement apartment. The next step he takes brings him level with his brother; something about the way he moves suggests he's placed himself in front even though he has not. "For yours no less than ours." He looks very much like he wishes to say something more, but finally holds his tongue and lets Lucien ask the questions. Tony's mouth thins for a moment when Matt moves, but when the man stops speaking his brows tick up in mild surprise. He misses a beat before he starts speaking, not quite covered by the sip of coffee he takes. "Plenty wrong with the world," he answers. "Both worlds. Trying to right some of it." His eyes shift between the two brothers, one quick flick and then away. "Head off some before it starts. Probably easier with someone who -- knows the score. Here." "You think that you are equipped to confront that possibility? I cannot say your track record is promising." Lucien's fingers keep tracing slow lines against his sweater. He looks aside, watching the fish glide in their aquaria as he breathes slow and steady. "If what you need is a tour guide, surely you have a world of options at your fingertips." Matt raises one eyebrow, then the other. "I doubt if he thinks he is, else he wouldn't be here." He's studying Tony carefully now, and when he speaks again his voice is gentle, showing none of the disdain and wariness beneath it. "An admirable ambition, whether or not you feel equipped. Was he your friend? The--other Lucien Tessier." "I'm not," Tony answers plainly, glancing to Matt with this answer. "Trying to be. Hoped that's where you'd come in." His jaw tightens at Matt's question. He lifts his cup again -- frowns when he tips it and finds it emptied. The drum of his fingers against its side is arrhythmic, hollow. "Was a lot of things. Friend. A good man. A good --" He doesn't finish this thought; he goes back to his pacing, a restless circling of the living room, eying the books on the shelves. "Worked with his brother a lot." Lucien lifts a hand, forefinger and thumb pressing to the hollows of his eyes. He trails further into the living room, but slowly, setting the book down on an end table and leaning one arm heavily against the back of the couch. "It seems inadequate to offer condolences on one loss when an entire world has been closed to you, and yet --" He lowers his hand to rest beside the other, weight pressing down against the sofa. "I understand you are dealing with. A lot. But what you are asking --" Again he falters, something tightening uncomfortably within his mind. "And yet. I am sorry for your loss," Matt says evenly. "Losses. I do not know how you worked with my counterpart, but I regret to inform you I am a simple high school teacher." His power threads tighter into his brother's, gently bolstering; his own weariness and rage he keeps tightly pressed down. "I imagine you are accustomed to getting your way without much ado, Mister Stark." His hands clasp together in front of him. "But, at least in your present circumstances, it may serve you better to show some consideration toward those whose help you seek. For example, by requesting an audience ahead of time, or thinking through what you actually want from them." His gaze is steely, and his tone does not waver. "Or, not having done any of that, at least heeding your host's repeated entreaties for you to remove your footwear in their house." "Right. And he was a simple college professor." Tony's hand has tightened on his empty coffee cup, caving one of its cardboard sides inward. "I'm asking a lot. Been handed a lot of power here. Last time I had it --" He huffs out a sharp breath. "This world already seems halfway to war. If I want advice on how we don't repeat past mistakes, a mutant with his ear to the ground -- good place to start." He turns from the bookshelf, eyebrows hiked as he meets Matt's gaze. "I need those. For walking." "I did not make the other Matthieu Tessier's acquaintance, but I did have the distinct impression he was not remotely so guileless as --" Lucien freezes, his eyes going wider and fixing on Tony. Sensible only to Matt something uncoils in his mind, threads itself through Tony's nervous system almost reflexively. His fingers dig a little harder down against the couch cushions, then slowly ease. At least some part of the tension in his mind eases with it, melting back into something more closely approximating his baseline. "Right." His voice is soft, his head tipped down. "My schedule is inflexible and my time quite dear. I trust that neither of those will be a problem for you." Matt blinks back at Tony, his expression inscrutable and his attention focused intently for a moment on Lucien's investigation. Then he glances at his brother, much of the tension bleeding from him. His anger has not all fled, but just like that, it is no longer fixated on their visitor. "My apologies," he says softly, inclining his head just a fraction. There's a flash of annoyance beneath his words that he lets go. "If you've more to discuss, I'll see to refreshments." He starts to make his slow way toward to kitchen and stops beside Tony. "Not simple, I suppose, no. But please, let me dispose of that." This request is just a touch wry as he holds out a hand for the paper cup, but what follows sounds earnestly matter-of-fact, "And would you like another coffee?"