milliways_bar | (no subject)

"Yeah, I heard there's an angel or something in the vicinity of 4000 years or so and there's another like me who's creeping toward 5000 - he's got about 500 years to go. I'm just a pup."

"Well, there's the angel, and the demon, and Nick, who I think said he's... what, eight hundred?"

She smiles a little at him.

"You still make me feel really young, though. I'm only in my twenties."

He nods. "Of course, how could I forget Nick?" He gives a bit of a roll of his eyes, but there's a smile in them - still. "I believe Van Helsing is actually much older than he remembers also, though guessing a year is nearly impossible."

He slides his empty cup into the middle of the table.

"If it makes you feel any better, I died - the first time - when I was eighteen."

She winces.

"Noo... can't say that that really does, actually. Wait, the first time? How many times have you died?" She raises an eyebrow.

He leans back in the chair and scratches at his chin, idly.

"A few. Seven or eight during the duel in Boston alone. Crazy Baron," he snorts.

The other eyebrow gets lonely, and goes on a quest to find the first to keep it company.

"... care to explain?"

"About the duel?" He half-shrugs. "Baron stabbed me about seven times. Finally, after I stood up for about the seventh time, I just apologized for calling his wife a bloated warthog - which, by the way, she was - and I left. I probably would have fared a bit better in the sword fighting had I not been half-full of some form of alcohol or other. Maybe quite a few forms," he finished with a grin.

She laughs. Something about this story is just... hilarious, really.

"That... heh. I don't know what to say to that, really, but... my question was more, how you could die seven or eight times and still consider yourself alive..."

"Immortality," he answers as though it's the same as answering that one puts sugar or milk into one's coffee in the morning to take the bitterness away.

She considers this for a moment.

"But... if you're immortal... how is it you're dying in the first place? I mean, sure, a mortal wound, getting stabbed in the heart or something that would kill someone... but do you actually die?"

He laughs - hers is a common question.

"For a moment or so, yeah. What seems to happen is that the mortal body does it's dying thing, then, once it's all healed, revives. Or so we've sort of figured."

She smiles a little. "That's... I dunno. Does it hurt?"

He shakes his head - but his heart's not in it - really.

"No, it tickles. Of course it hurts." He's smiling - he's answered that one before too.

"Sometimes it hurts a lot. Broken bones are almost worse than bullet wounds."

She leans back, and manages to keep a smile, although it's not a particularly happy one.

"Don't know if it sounds like it's worth the tradeoff, that."

He shrugs.

"I try not to die any more than I have to. But, it is nice to know that if something happens, like, I fall off a building or get into a car accident, that I'll be okay sometime afterward."

He wrinkles his nose a bit.

"By the way, word of advice, don't fall off a building. Hurts like hell," he adds with a grin.

"I'll... make sure to keep that in mind, I guess..."

She manages to grin back at him eventually.

"How on earth did we manage to get to such a morbid subject, anyway? Let's get back to something lighthearted?"

He shrugs and grins.

"Okay, so, what should we change the subject to?"

"Heck, I dunno... tea or coffee? Have we covered that one yet?"

Her greygreen eyes are dancing with laughter.

It's a bit of a change, really.

He laughs.

"Not yet, but if we're going to discuss beverages, I suggest Scotch vs. Tequilla."

She smirks a little.

"Is that an offer, or a challenge?"

"Perhaps a bit of both," he replies with a wry grin.

"Are you buying, then? Or is Nick?" She blithely ignores the fact that this conversation has been going on since long before Nick made his offer to put everything on his tab for the night, and grins at him.

"Well, what's a holiday if we don't put it on Nick's tab? He won't mind."

(( and who's to say they haven't been sitting here talking long enough to *hear* Nick's offer? *g* ))

She chuckles.

"Okay, so, it's scotch or tequila, then? Which'll you be wanting first?"

"Depends on the Scotch. Because one never mixes the excellent Scotch with the tequilla. At least, this one doesn't." He offers a smile.

"Start with the tequilla."