milliways_bar | (no subject)

A grim black-haired man, dressed in black, with a large axe and a Security badge on his belt, passes by, notices Autor, and gives him a deep look.

Autor feels the stare sliding over his skin before he acknowledges it. He turns his head slowly, as it's still full of cotton--oh, no, I'm getting sick from this mess, aren't I?--and returns the look with one of his own. Not as deep, a little more petulant, but just as assessing.

Black, black, black, middle-aged?, old time period, human?, weapon... Security badge. Damn.

He adjusts his glasses. "Yes?"

"I think," the grim axe-man says, "Gene Hunt mentioned you. He could not fully say if you had truly broken our rules, or were just a nuisance, which carries no punishment."

"No, Gene wouldn't be able to tell between the two, would he?" Autor says coolly, taking a little bottle labeled hand sanitizer out of his pocket.

Normally he'd exercise caution in an interview like this, and offer more respect when he's staring down an axe and a badge, but no. Not now. He's tired. He's tired, and he's right, and he just doesn't care anymore.

"I'm a nuisance, and a 'paranoid wanker', as he says--though I suspect you'll want to judge that for yourself." he says, and closes his book around his notes. Then he codes them all into his sylladex.

"Walk with me," he says, and hops off his barstool to stroll to the grounds.

There is the tiniest hint of a smile on the grim man's face.

"Indeed, 'paranoid wanker' completely sounds like Gene Hunt," he says, making to follow the kid.

Once outside, Autor places a hand on his hip and turns to face the man--still a bit dizzy. "All right. Do you have questions for me or should I just start throwing arguments at you and seeing which ones stick?"

The grim man regards him grimly.

"What were you taking those notes for, that have all so worried?" he asks, blankly.

Autor sighs, but his sharpened gaze doesn't waver. "I'm a music student by trade, but an aspiring writer. How could I not look around and see this opportunity to gather inspiration?

"Plus, these dossiers are sort of a filing cabinet for me. There are so many fascinating people here, and the only way to even come close to processing them all is through writing."

"May I see one of those reports?" the Security man asks. "I see you have a sylladex, from the trolls; one would assume you keep it in there?"

Autor doesn't wince, but he does suck a quiet breath between his teeth. "That's a reasonable request, but I do want to voice my objection up front. These are essentially lists of information I've taken down from private conversations I had with other people, and I'd prefer not to expose what they told me in confidence to Security.

"This is the report which Guppy's son, Fry, saw," he says, withdrawing Yugo's from his pocket, folded into quarters, "and then alerted Gene. At the time, I thought Yugo would die during the eclipse, but it turns out that he did not. Thankfully."

It occurs to Autor that he may want to let Yugo know about all of this, given he was an unwilling party to it. Watching the grim man read, the student applies a bit more of the gel from the hand sanitizer bottle on his hands.

Edited 2013-05-16 19:35 (UTC)

"That smells," the grim man says, not looking up from the paper. "Does the one you wrote about, know of this?"

It does smell, but not like hand sanitizer. Now Autor's wondering if the man before him has animal-characteristics, like a super sensitive nose, or can transfigure himself, or...

But now is not the time for such questions.

"He doesn't yet," Autor says, clasping his hands behind his back. "I plan to tell him shortly."

"He shall not be pleased, that all and sundry know this about him," the grim man says. "Is he from your world?"

"You're right," Autor says viciously, narrowing his eyes. His frustration isn't directed at Teja, but the situation as a whole, and he hopes the grim man can see that. "He won't be pleased. All and sundry wouldn't know all this about him if the document was returned to me immediately rather than read and acted upon without my permission.

"And no, he's not from my world."

"Then what is it that you gain from this?" the grim man asks.

"I think you've already asked that question," Autor says. "And as I told you: this is the way I keep track of the world, and I gain inspiration for my own writing by speaking to others."

"And I still do not believe that is all there is to it," the grim man declares.

Waiting.

"I plan to come into power someday, and I need practice quickly gathering information about allies and enemies," Autor says simply. "I do not plan to use these against anyone here--there are too many dangerous people. Like you.

"You're difficult to read," the boy says, tilting his head. "You're old, probably deceased? As far as I can tell, you're extremely honorable, and though you acknowledge duplicity in others, you don't seem to engage in it yourself. You're observant and detail-oriented. You've given me a chance to speak, and will let me speak myself into a corner while you gladly watch. You're likely slow to make judgments, but they'll be final, and logically supported."

He smiles. "I do appreciate your asking to see the piece in question first. I'd take you over Gene any day, even though you could kill me before I blink. I don't think you will, though, at least not yet. Who are you?"

The grim man neither agrees nor denies anything that Autor says, but instead simply nods. "So I got to hear the notes on me, before you even write them."

Pause.

"I am Teja, son of Tagila; I was the last king of the Ostrogoths in Italy and died in battle, on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius, in the year 552 of Christian reckoning," he then announces.

"Part of them," Autor murmurs, noting the simple nod. It reminds him of Lohengrin.

But when the king announces his name, Autor steps forward and stumbles. He places his wrist on his forehead and drops to one knee.

Then he laughs. Helpless, debilitating laughter, which tears at his sides and chokes the air from him.

"Sorry, I'm sorry," he stammers, wiping tears from his eyes. "But of all the people they could have sent, I am amazed that it's you."

"None sent me," Teja says, raising an eyebrow at Autor's odd behaviour. "I am here by myself, as I am dead; this is my after-life."

Pause.

Then, he adds, "Who did you think sent me?"

Autor stands, and scrubs at his face, still chuckling. "I seem to have the unfortunate misconception that Security is at all organized," he says, "rather than just showing up where they hope wrongdoers are."

He stands up a little straighter and draws a breath or two. "Please forgive my reaction. I laughed because your legend survived to my time. I know you."

The boy still has his own dog-eared copy of Ein Kampf um Rom given to him by his grandfather.

"We come when we are called," Teja says. "We are no more than the watch-dogs of this place. We deal out no justice, we have no code of law: we simply make sure that three rules are kept in this place. It is much different from what I worked with when I was alive. If you know who I am, from reading your Procopius, one would presume, then you must know about my people, also."

"Right, so who called you?" Autor asks, adjusting his glasses.

Luckily, the boy has read Procopius' Secret History, because he loved Struggle for Rome so much.

Make way, you people, for our stride.
We are the last of the Goths.
We do not carry a crown with us,
We carry but a corpse.

Autor gazes at the broad-shouldered king clad in mourning, and nods. "Yes," he says. "I know the Ostrogoths."

"We dealt our justice in public, and based on laws long-established," Teja says. "It was very different from here. This is a bar; we are the bouncers. You know what the three rules are?"