ArchivedLogs:Growing Up

Growing Up
Dramatis Personae Doug, Sebastian
In Absentia	2014-04-12 '
Location <NYC> Stark Tower - Midtown East
A gleaming beacon of modern architecture shining bright amidst the industry of Midtown, Stark Tower serves as headquarters to one of the largest tech corporations in the world. The offices and boardrooms of Stark Industries and any number of satellite companies, subsidiaries, and nonprofits are homed here. To the public what draws most visitors is not the business but the science -- the first two floors of the building hold an extensive museum dedicated to technological innovation. As well, guided tours three days a week are open to the public, to be shown through both the museum and, more notably, through (select parts of) the dozen floors dedicated solely to R&D.The building itself is as eye-catching inside as outside. The soaring lobby atrium extends upwards, bright and glass-walled with perpetually bustling balconies ringing each floor. All visitors must pass through the lobby security checkpoints to be signed in. The technology integrated into the building, from the interactive holographic displays that help guide visitors to their destination to the quiet AI that remembers visitors' preferences upon repeat visits to the basement arc reactor that powers the entire building, are quiet reminders of the company's dedication to innovation. Sebastian has, since the fire, gotten back to his old self again. Both in body and in attire, it seems -- today at work the diminutive blue teenager is dressed colorful-bright. The warm weather has him in a /skirt/, now that spring has chosen to be springlike, short and silver and blue and paired with a tight black tank top over which he's paired a sheer wrap top with flowing sleeves, tied over his chest. Silver eyeliner stands out stark against his blue skin, faintly glittery black lipstick on his lips. He showed up at work early this morning, escorted in by his father with promises of escorting /back/ whenever he was done tonight; for now he's ensconced amid a series of floating holographic displays. Lines of code on one side, a breakdown of a robotic exoskeleton leg on another -- it's not /his/ team's project, but someone's asked him for help troubleshooting and he's frowning at someone /else's/ work, always a fun exercise in frustration. After a pause he scrubs a hand against his face, turning aside to toy instead with the gold dragonfly robot on the table beside him; as he moves aside from his workstation it floats up to follow him, away from his station and towards the plentifully available /food/. Someone, it seems, needs a brain break. Doug's first week has been a bit of an adjustment. First in his schedule to allow for the extra train time from Westchester, and then being reassigned to a new team. Which is why he's entering the lab an hour or so after Sebastian's arrival. Dressed in new-looking jeans and a similarly new green t-shirt with the Tri-Force on the chest, the blond carries his laptop bag, rather than having it slung across his chest. He looks tired, actually, as he pushes into the lab and finds his workspace. He doesn't notice Sebastian's presence right away, opting to fish out his laptop and open it up. He taps at the keys, initiating something involving lines of code before he moves away from the desk and towards the food table (and possibly the coffee). He freezes when he spots the tiny figure, stopping and staring in a sudden rush of uncertainty. "Oh." Sebastian has been picking up a bag of turkey jerky, evidently just going to claim the whole /thing/ and take it back to his desk. But he stops, nose twitching with a slow deep growl rumbling up from his throat as he turns. His gills flutter, growl thrumming louder and then abruptly grinding to a halt. His claws stab hard into the plastic of the bag, and he draws in a deep breath, taking a step back until his thigh thunks against the edge of one of the food carts. His enormous black eyes fix uncomfortably on Doug, and then lower. Slowly he scoots to one side, motion stiff. "{Sorry,}" he says in stilted Vietnamese, "did you need to get --" He waves his jerky-laden hand towards the rows of cabinets and fridges and tables behind him. The hair on the back of Doug's neck prickles at that growl; a primitive instinct screaming at him to get away from someone making that noise. His legs even twitch as if he might actually turn and bolt. He winces as Sebastian focuses on him, and drops his chin to his chest, breaking eye contact with the younger teen just before Sebastian's gaze lowers. The apology brings color flooding into his ears, and he jerks his chin slightly. "Yeah," he says, his voice ragged-sounding as he edges towards the tables. He keeps a distance from Sebastian as he slides around the table. "Yogurt." He stops moving on the other side of the tables, though, and hunches his shoulders as he jams his hands into his pockets. The end result looks rather like rain should be falling on him. Cold rain. With tiny hailstones in it. Bastian takes another step farther from the fridges when Doug clarifies his purpose here, gesturing towards the snacks-fridge (as opposed to the drinks-fridge or leftovers-fridge, there are Many Fridges) in -- indication? invitation? it's a desultory sort of gesture. He curls his arm in towards his chest, eyes still fixed on the ground. There's a sort of /slink/ to his step, moving back away from Doug to stick to the edges of the room as he creeps away -- but stops, to turn -- his eyes don't lift. His brow creases, though, one foot (clad in chunky platform ankle boots, black and silver-studded) lifting to thud the toe agains the heel of the opposite boot. "... why did you do it." Doug flinches at the question, and he hunkers over even further. Or as much as his back will allow, which isn't /that/ significant. His hair, still ragged at the edges from the fire, falls into his face as he screws his eyes shut, and clamps his jaw tightly. When he speaks, his voice is low, and breaks. "N-no good reason." He inhales as if he might say more, and then shakes his head. He moves towards the Snack Fridge, but only manages a step or two before he stops, and speaks again in the same low, ragged voice. "I didn't...mean. To." He shakes his head again, forcing his feet back into slow, zombie-like motion. "Didn't. /Mean/ to. You took all the cameras down by /accident/." Bastian sounds juuust slightly skeptical, here. His voice is low, eyes still turned down towards the floor. His gills ripple once, his back pressing up against the wall. "Why did you /do/ it?" Doug stops short of his goal again, his shoulders twitching once. "Didn't mean for that to happen," takes longer to say than it should, and it sounds like Doug is perilously close to crying. "Get people...." He breaks off, pulling a hand out of his pocket to scrub at his face. The repeated question gets a slow shrug. "I was being stupid," is equally slow and miserable sounding, but his speech picks up as he continues. "And selfish. And short-sighted." He inhales deeply, and exhales a ragged sound as he scrubs at his face again. His mouth moves as if there might be more, but he clamps it shut with an audible click of his teeth. "Get eighteen people killed?" Bastian replies, quiet and oddly calm. "Get my /little brother/ killed? Is that all the explanation you're going to give me?" His breaths are timed in counterpoint to Doug's, exhaling when Doug breathes in, breathing in again with Doug's ragged exhale. "/Why/," he asks again, soft but /firmer/, now, "did you /do it/?" "What do you want to hear, Sebastian?" Doug's voice, still weepy, sounds weary when he asks this. "What could I possibly say that's going to make /any/ of this any better?" He raises his hand, waving it at the world beyond the walls of Stark Tower. "That I'm /shit/ at dealing with stuff like real emotions and relationships? That I let my injured, delusional /pride/ lead to the most terrible thing I could ever imagine happening?" He lifts his shoulder, and raises his chin. His eyes are red-rimmed, but they're dry at the moment. "That I'm a fucking selfish, worthless excuse for a human being, much less a friend?" He sighs, and drops his hand. "Because all of that is true." "Nothing's going to make it /better/, Doug." Sebastian's eyes lift, a little wider when they finally settle on Doug. His gills are fluttering again; it breaks up his words in uneven hitching. "I just wanted to hear the story from you and /even now/ you don't even have the respect to --" He exhales, dropping his eyes to the ground again. "I don't want," he says, quiet again, "your /self-flagellation/. Just --" His hands scrub over his face, and his tone here is /heavy/, sad, more than sharp. "Just for you to grow up." "You want the whole story?" Irritation works its way into Doug's misery, and he furrows his brow as he clears his throat. When he starts talking again, his voice is steadier, but still ragged as he elaborates. "Okay. When I first met Micah, I got a really bad crush on him. Which, obvious to everyone but /me/ was a non-starter." He inhales deeply, and exhales in a ragged sigh. "He even /told/ me he had a rule against dating teenagers..." He shakes his head, and rubs at the side of his nose roughly. "It killed me when he and Jackson got together. And I tried to get over it. I really did." He nods, not looking at Sebastian as he continues, but staring off into space as he works through it. "But it kept...coming up. To deal with. And for some reason...I just /couldn't/. I felt so alone, and he was so /nice/. It /was/ nice. But not in the way I wanted." He closes his eyes, and shakes his head. "And I convinced myself that, now that he was married, it really /was/ a non-issue. I could finally /move on/. And then I saw..." He opens his eyes, and his expression is one of confused exasperation. Water pushes at the rim of his eyes, and he shrugs limply. "I just -- broke. Inside. And the only thing that made it right in my head was to disable the thing that broke me." He takes another ragged inhale/exhale, and finally looks back at Sebastian, the water spilling from one eye to be dashed away by his hand. "I'll never be able to make it right. I don't even know how to go about /trying/." Sebastian stays leaning against the wall, thudding one heel against the opposite toe, again. His fingers toy with the knot in his tied-off shirt, his gills fluttering -- quick, at the start of Doug's story, slower by the end of it. "Maybe you can't," he finally says, with a small shrug. "I mean, maybe you just --" He swallows, thudding one boot against the other again. "-- I've /actually/ killed people, you know." It's just -- simple, and plain, when he says it, brows slowly wrinkling and his hands dropping to his side. "You can't. Hit undo or. Make it /up/. You can't really fill that gap in the world. You kind of have to fill that gap in -- in /yourself/. So that you don't -- keep. /Making/. Those gaps." "It doesn't feel like a gap," Doug says, scrubbing at his now-reddened nose. "It feels raw, and tight. Like the scar on my back goes right through my soul." He shakes his head, and drops his chin. "Maybe because I /can't/ make up for it. Maybe it'll just burn there forever." He shakes his head, and shuffles his feet, staring at his sneakers. "I won't be making any more, whatever it is. If I can help it." He sighs, and looks back up at the younger man. "Costs too much for everyone." "Maybe it will," Sebastian agrees. "Some things stick with you. Some things /should/ stick with you." His gills flutter, fingers twisting again at he fabric of his shirt. His clear inner eyelids blink rapidly, head tilting slightly to one side as he looks at Doug. "What are you going to do now?" "I hope it does," Doug says, shrugging limply. "Maybe not like it does now. But I'm never going to forget it." The question gets another shrug. "I don't know," he says. "I'm done with school for the semester. Guess I'm going to look for a new apartment. Try to move on. Get better at..." he presses his mouth tight for a moment. "Just get better at being better." Sebastian exhales, sharp, lifting both hands to press them to the sides of his neck and hold his gills down. A faint smile almost manages to work its way onto his face, touching his lips and then slipping away again a moment later. "I think that one's kind of -- something /everyone/ works at. Kind of /forever/." His boots thud against each other again and he opens his mouth once more, but then his teeth clack back closed. His eyes lift towards Doug, then drop back to the floor. "-- Good luck with it." Still hugging the wall rather closely, he turns, slinking back out of the room to return to his workstation. "Some people are more successful at it than others, though," Doug says, starting back on his path to the fridge. "Everyone's been better at it than I have." He manages a smile for this poor joke, but it doesn't reach his eyes. The wish of luck gets a lift of his hand and he nods, watching Sebastian until he's out of the room. Then he's turning back to the fridge, leaning forward until his forehead touches the cool exterior and then slowly, slowly, begins to bang it there gently.