milliways_bar | (no subject)

We ride at the hour past dawn tomorrow.

Duke Roger's closing words continue to echo through Alanna's mind long after she should have been asleep. Tossing and turning begins to lose any appeal around midnight, so she checks her binding, pulls on her clothes and scoops up a sleepy Faithful. After buckling Lightning to her hips, Alanna pads out of her room, past Jonathan's, and only lets herself breathe once she's alone in the hallway.

The decisions made in the meeting of Duke Roger's commanders are making her extremely uneasy and a little ill. She knows Jonathan is angry at his new command, far from Fort Drell, but Alanna is upset for other reasons that have everything to do with a deep suspicion of the man who decided to place him there.

"Maybe a few hours at Milliways will allow me to rest," she murmurs to the heavy cat wrapped around her neck. "I doubt we'll be able to go there again for a long while, after all."

Faithful fails to respond.

She moves quietly through the halls and is careful to look around before slipping through the door to the bar. It's loud and bright after the quiet corridors of the sleeping palace, but she's glad of the noise, the life. If she can't get to the Dove, this is the next best thing.

Rubbing one of her eyes, Alanna settles into a chair by the fire and hopes a wait rat will happen by soon. She's awake, yet curiously far too tired and preoccupied to see about getting some tea herself.

[OOC: I wanted to go ahead and get this up. I will be around for a bit, but I'll need to beg slowtimes almost immediately this AM. It is open forever, however, and I will be around to tag as much as my super annoying body lets me! :) ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Alfred Pennyworth, at your service," he replies formally.

"The estate is a fair size. A large Manor house and respectable grounds, but most of the wealth, these days at any rate, is in Wayne Enterprises."

"It doesn't sound as if you are from Tortall," Alanna notes, smiling at his formality. "We have estates and manor houses, but no Wayne Enterprises. What manner of business is it?"

She gestures to the tea. "May I?"

"Most certainly," he replies. That was why he brought it over here, rather than somewhere else

"No, I've never heard of Tortall before. I'm from a planet we call Earth, in the country of the United States of America. Gotham, to be precise. As for Wayne Enterprises, well, these days, it makes just about anything."

"Anything? I can see why Wayne Enterprises is successful, then."

She pours the tea -- only a tiny bit sloshes out the side, thanks to years spent pouring wine -- and offers him the first cup with a raised eyebrow.

"This Bruce Wayne must trust you a great deal. I know I trust Coram, who is also such a guardian."

He takes the cup with a nod of thanks.

"He, er, didn't have much say in the matter. Although, I don't think he'd have chosen anyone else. I was his guardian for the 10 years before he disappeared."

Alanna smiles.

"Coram was mine. And Thom's, my twin. We were a handful," she tells him cheerfully.

Her eyes lift from the tea she has just poured for herself to study his face.

"What happened to him?"

His face falls very slightly at the memory.

"He ran away. The night his parents murdered was released. No one back home's heard from him for nearly 4 years."

"Goddess," she breathes out. "I'm sorry."

Murdered parents: far worse than one dead in childbirth and the other dead of disinterest in the world.

"How old is he?" Alanna wonders.

Alfred thinks for a moment. It's not actually something he's thought about recently.

"He was 21 when he disappeared. He'd be about 24 now."

To say nothing of the wierdness of Milliways, and him actually being about 27/28 in here...

"Oh."

Not a young boy, then.

Older than Jon, even. Closer to George's age. Huh.

"Do you think someone is preventing him from returning?"

Alfred pauses, recalling his first discussion with Bruce here.

"I don't know so much about someone as it is something."

His guilt over the gun to start with.

Alanna nods slowly. There's a significant difference, of course, and as long as he's not being held against his will she forces herself not to pry.

She's curious, though.

Very.

The has to bite her lower lip until she can speak without asking more sort of curious.

"Perhaps he'll come back. In time."

"Perhaps. Though, if he doesn't come back in the next few years, he'll be declared dead anyway. God only knows what would happen if he came back after that..."

There'd be uproar for a start. Particularly among the board, who'll quite probably do very nicely for themselves when he is declared dead.

Her eyebrows shoot up.

"He'd give people a good shock, I suppose."

A small smile.

"You miss him?"

Alfred's smile is wry, but there. He would indeed. And maybe even if he comes back before then.

"I do."

It's complicated, because Thomas trusted Alfred to look after Bruce, and he feels like he's failed at that. And then he comes here, and meets a Bruce who recognises him, and seems fine. And is from the future.

"I wonder sometimes if Coram and Maude miss Thom and I," she admits, eyes glazing over with memories for a moment. "We were... troublemakers."

Right. 'We.' Sure.

I do hope you'll forgive Alfred if all he does is smile knowingly. Bruce could be a rascal himself, before he fell down that well.

[ooc: fade? Though, these two should talk again :D]

[OOC: Sure thing. Thanks for bearing with the epic slowtime! :) ]