metamorphotic | you've got to carry your heart like a torch in the night.

[she moves quickly but efficiently in her work, pouring the drink as ordered and sliding the glass across the bar to drifter. the last three minutes of her shift are up, so she pours a second glass for herself and carries it around the bar, taking the seat next to drifter.]

City don’t always mean civilized. Back home, I lived in a pretty big city - not quite as big as this place, but close - and I worked in a bar, pretty much just like this one. Got one hell of a scar on my shoulder from breaking up a knife fight while on duty - first time in my life I ever needed stitches. Haven’t had any problems in this place, though.

[she shrugs, takes a sip of her drink, takes a moment to give him a closer looking-over now that there’s no bar between them. he looks dangerous, but not threatening - a combination that could go either way.]

So ... who do I have to thank for the referral?

Somebody that was pretty interested in my wares, too. Said he'd rather my business not go to the north side of town. I said I couldn't promise anything, but if he directed me to any parties who might be willin' to find out more on whatever cross universe tech the Head is usin', I might be obliged to restrain myself.

Your name got dropped as potential.

[He rifles the coin between his fingers, not dishing out any names. Yet, anyway. He doubts that particular guy would be ratting anyone out. He'd probably die first. But Drifter keeps his voice low when he's sayin' all of it.]

As a man with a little bit of experience with interdimensional portal tech, transmats, digitech... I was thinkin' that maybe if I had access to the right materials, and the right specs? Let's just say I never liked bein' threatened, or used.

Yeah ... I never met anyone who likes bein’ used.

[a lot of the people who were brought here would be be interested in knowing where the tech is that brought them and how it works, and the heart’s at the top of that list. it’s one of the biggest pieces they haven’t yet been able to uncover, and one of the things they’re hoping those they’d spoken with in the warehouse would be able to help them uncover.

they’d established a back door into the head’s files on the new arrivals, but files only provide part of the picture. that’s part of nick’s role, to make a face to face assessment of who can be helpful and whether they can be trusted. hank was pretty easy to read, but this drifter guy’s more of a mystery than most.

the approach isn’t terribly different, though - talk to him, try to get a sense for who he is. and that usually starts with sharing some of her own story.]

This isn’t my first time gettin’ shuffled around dimensions or worlds or whatever you wanna call it. Between home and here, I’ve been jerked around a bunch of times in the past few years - lost in space for some of it, having wacky adventures, and that was no one’s fault, but the rest was on a ruined planet run by a group of shitheads that fed on our emotions. They were all assholes, ‘cept for Delight. She was cool - liked to help people feel good, y’know? Made a bar, kept it stocked, even gave me a job working there. Bein’ a bartender’s all I really know how to do. And it was still feeding Delight, but I figured that wasn’t so bad, ‘cause that bar was the one thing that made living in that shithole tolerable. Lesser evil, I guess.

[she shrugs and takes a sip of her drink.]

Eventually, the bar got blown up, and Delight sold us all out to the robots that wanted to kill all of us. Funny how it’s been robots so much of the time. I’m an analog girl m’self - all this tech shit kinda creeps me out. But you can probably see why someone who shows up out of nowhere offering to help might seem suspicious.

[she knew that revealing herself at the warehouse meeting was a risk, and it would likely lead to people seeking her out as a point person for the heart. but nick’s confident that she can handle the risks.]

What kinds of specialty items were you talkin’ about in that note you left for me?

[So this isn't the first place? Not very surprising. He listens in, and while he's interested, the meaning of the story doesn't escape him.]

[He finishes off the drink he ordered, slides the glass towards her.]

While I do wanna hear more about these other dimensions [because so far he's only been able to access two] and it's mighty sweet of you to try and explain why you wouldn't trust me, I never expected you to. I brought you a present to prove my worth. Worth ain't trust. Trust costs a lot more.

[There's a reason that he calls his gun 'trust', and uses the word in almost a joking manner sometimes. Because, really, no one ever trusts him. Nor can he fault them for it. He got in the habit of lying about who and what he was a long, long time ago. Often not for ill-intent, just out of self-preservation, or the desire to live normally. But, still, it is a nasty habit to get into.]

When we're alone I'll show ya. I'm a shy fella.

[lying - or omitting parts of the truth - about who and what you are in order to survive and hold on to a sense of normalcy is something nick is quite familiar with. in her younger, more cynical days, she’d say that everyone lies to the world about their true selves, and that she’d given up the pretense of being anything but a monster when she was still a child. but she’s grown a bit since then. people still lie, of course, and she knows what to look for, but nick has a better understanding of the reasons for it now. and she no longer claims to be a monster - not in the same way she did then, at least.]

Oh, so you’re already planning on getting me alone? [she leans an elbow into the bar and grins playfully.] Gotta warn you, though - I’m about as sweet as salt.

[the grin fades slightly behind her glass as she takes another drink, and by the time nick sets the glass down again, her expression’s almost sober.]

Trust is - it’s hard. Even harder if you’ve spent your whole life gettin’ the shit kicked outta you. But it’s also important - ‘specially in a place like this.

[something she only learned once she left chicago. something she really only began to embrace during her stays in hadriel. she taps a fingernail against the glass, allowing herself a moment to get lost in her thoughts, then her focus returns to the man sat in front of her.]

Well, while you’re waiting to get me alone, why don’t you tell me ‘bout where you’re from? You said it’s frontiersy. Are we talkin’ Wild West or “boldly going where no man has gone before”?

Little bit of column A. Little bit of column B. Aliens came and trashed our world for somethin' real valuable they wanted a piece off. And this thing? Broke off little parts of itself.

[He stretches a hand out to pick up some silverware. He unfolds the napkin and removes the steak knife.]

Those little parts got called 'Ghosts', went out and found a bunch of people that could fight an' brought em back from the dead. So you had the humans and the 'Risen'. The 'Lightbearers'. No discriminatin' about personality. Got warlords who just wanted to overun everything, big factions that took advantage of humans, so it got a little wild-westy out there.

[As he finishes the sentence, he pushes his hand down on the knife, body positioned so no one else will see. He yanks it up, and before blood can even drip to the counter top it's being sucked back into the wound. Palm bared while the healing happens.]

Someone can try to live normal in that wild west, but it ain't gonna happen. That big thing everybody was fightin' for? Acted like it wanted to bring us a prosperous life. A good future. All it did was make the normal people defenseless to a bigger enemy they had no clue was comin'. And even a full thousand years, things still are a chore out there on the frontier. Just as bad in different ways.

[He offers her the knife. That's the one other thing he can bring to the table besides his 'ware's. He's immortal.]

Sorry for the silverware this late in the game. [It might not be trust, but an immortal might have a legitimate interest in being able to stay out of the Head's devices.]

[nick listens quietly, attentive to drifter’s story as the words wind through the air like smoke from a lit cigarette. when he performs that knife stunt, she gasps quietly, then claps a hand over her mouth, but continues watching closely, eyes wide with shock.

and if he’s speaking of himself on the subject of trying to live normal, that’s one step in the right direction toward her favor, if not her trust. she knows a little something about that, too - something that’s probably only fair to show him, later.]

Shit, [she whispers, and takes the knife to place it to the far side of her on the counter. it’s not done out of distrust, but to discourage another such display. she can’t imagine that was pleasant for him.]

So ... is that you? You’re one of the Risen - a Lightbearer?

[she frowns, gently biting down on her lower lip.]

Can I see? [his stabbed hand, she means.]

[He has no intention to, no worries about that. But he'd rather he see it under his terms than, say, getting shot. And the extent to which he can heal.]

I am, and some of us are newer than others. But me? I've been around a while.

[He lets her see his hand, and it is indeed as good as new. His abilities are limited already on their speed of being replenished, so not much is changed. It's enough to keep him good in a fight. Even with his experience, he thinks he can take on at least one iteration without dying. A bunch, however, and a problem happens.]

[That is until he gets some more weapons.]

Good as new. Not even scars. [Meaning whatever happened to his face must have happened before he was immortal.]

[a while is pretty open-ended, but nick guesses he must mean on the much longer side of that range. it makes her think of graham, her mentor of sorts, back in vancouver, and ushahin, her friend in hadriel who gave the term millennial an entirely different meaning. she wonders, not for the first time, what it feels like to live that long and acquire so many memories over so many years. she wonders how she will feel once she too reaches that age - if she manages to live that long. if she doesn’t make any fatal mistakes.

it’s with this knowledge that nick now concludes that drifter would have nothing to gain by lying about wanting to help the heart’s efforts. chances are high that betraying them to the head would mean he’d only end up stuck here for a much longer time.

very gently, she reaches out to take his hand in hers and inspect where the wound would be with a light brush of her fingertips. as he said - good as new, no scar. her gaze lifts to center on his face again, expression a mix of curiosity and concern.]

Doesn’t it hurt when you do that?

[She's still much more capable of kindness than him. He? Has it inside of him, but it's like shrapnel in his soul. Small, unpleasant pings of pain that come around with memories. He has cut off his sense of companionship but it's left phantom limb syndrome. It's not going to grow back, but where it once was echoes in his mind.]

[He doesn't flinch from the touch. She needs to see.]

It hurts like hell when it happens. Not after. And I didn't want to have to get shot or near killed to prove it. That was easier.

[There's no pleasure in harming himself. Definitely no pleasure in other people harming him, even if that's his expectation.]

[He wants more than the Head. He wants so much more.] But if it does happen, I promise you sister, I come back twice as strong just from how pissed off I am. Right to the very core. That's the thing, I heal from this? But I don't from bein' sick. I gotta die all the way and come back, real slow and painful. The Head can still get what it wants out of experimentin' on me.

[nick laughs under her breath and releases drifter’s hand.]

Been a while since anyone’s called me sister.

[she’s genuinely amused, but it reminds her of tim and how she’s been separated from him in being brought to this little side quest, and her mouth presses into a tight line as this memory forces its way to the front of her mind. it’s one of the reasons she joined this group of revolutionaries, after all.

and if nick had any lingering reservations as to drifter’s sincerity about making an alliance of sorts with the heart, they vanish in light of what he states about dying and coming back, about experiencing sickness, about anger. that’s the last piece of what she needs to hear, and she nods, mind made up. she believes him.]

You wanna get out of here, show me what you wanted to show me? I think ... maybe I’ve got somethin’ to show you, too.

[He wriggles his fingers as they're released, just because while he doesn't much mind being touched if he's allowing it, he's actually not made skin contact in quite a while. He's worn gloves for years thanks to his armaments. Bare skin is still strange.]

[He sometimes wears gloves now just to hide from distraction. Not that having her check out his hand was bad in any way.]

Well, I guess it's time for that 'I'll show ya mine if you show me yours' line. [He leans on the bar to wait, polite about it since, as far as he's concerned, he's got all the time in the world. Patience is something he's learned in spades.]

[nick stands up from the stool and returns behind the bar to place their glasses in the sink. she raises an eyebrow at that cheesy as hell line, barely managing to suppress another laugh.]

Wow. I think I haven’t heard that line in about ... five years? Or twelve, depending on how you count the time. Frat boy used it trying to pick me up - what was his name, Jeff? Brad?

[she shrugs - it doesn’t really matter what his name was, he was barely a blip on her radar - and tilts her head toward the main door, this way.

they don’t have far to go, just to a plain, small door on the right, set between the bar and the neighboring barber shop. nick presses her palm to the lock plate and holds the door open for drifter, then slips inside and leads the way up a flight of stairs to the second floor, unlocking the door to her apartment in the same manner as the door downstairs.

it’s a smallish space, more cozy than cramped, and there is no technology in the city’s standard for current in sight - no computer, not even a television. nick taps a lamp on the bookshelf near the door to fill the apartment’s interior with soft illumination and waves her guest an invitation to come inside.]

Sorry, [she says, picking up a black sweater tossed over the back of the comfortably worn couch,] I wasn’t expecting company.

[a half-empty water glass is swept up from the coffee table in front of the couch as she makes her way to close the curtain in front of the window overlooking the street. the rest of the furniture is similarly worn but in good shape: another bookshelf full of haphazardly stacked paperbacks and records, an old boxy stereo and record player perched on the topmost shelf, an overstuffed chair to the side of the couch and next to her guitar in its stand. nick picks up an open notebook on the floor next to the guitar and closes it, then tosses it on the coffee table and disappears into the tiny, adjacent kitchen to drop off the items collected in her tidying up. she returns a moment later and crosses the floor of the living room to reach the stereo, pressing down the button to play the tape resting inside the deck. it’s a homemade mix tape, found among a crate of random curios in the bar’s basement shop. the warmth of a woman’s voice winds through a sinuous song of cold synthetic beats and beeps, loud enough to obscure but not entirely drown out the conversation that’s about to begin.]

So. [nick turns to face wherever drifter’s decided to land.] Who’s goin’ first with the show-and-tell?

[Drifter's immediately strange when he comes in. He doesn't settle, not exactly. But he goes around to look at whatever books she has, picking one up and flipping through the pages curiously. The paper's not brittle and old.]

[It's the little things that remind him of the old world, and sometimes he thinks he remembers. Looking at the stereo, the record player, things from Before enter his mind. His previous life, belonging to a man that actually had a name. It's just bits and pieces he can't quite assemble.]

[He's still standing when she comes in, this time eyeing a clock, before he stalls, opens his coat, and pulls out what's very obviously a gun. A strange one, with swirling energy caught behind a grid in the middle. He lets it hang in his hand, though, offering it lightly.]

A free sample with thirty rounds. Submachine gun. I call this 'The Bug Out Bag'.

[He lays it on the ground and steps away from it so it's not so much of a threat.]

Stick a man in the apocalypse for a good millennia and he picks up a few skills. One of those is makin' stuff out of next to nothin'. And I figured you might need to be equipped to fend off some robots.

I can make a lot bigger than that.

[He gives her plenty of room to pick it up and take a look at it.]

[despite growing up in a tiny town in rural kansas, and despite all the dangers she’s faced in other worlds, nick’s never held a gun before. neither has the heart utilized weapons like this in the time they’ve been active, sticking instead to constructing homemade explosives, because the parts can be acquired without raising too much suspicion. until drifter made contact, there hadn’t been a weaponsmith they’d trusted enough to risk placing an order. this could change everything.

nick approaches the gun warily, more out of caution for the gun itself than concern that it’s some kind of trap drifter’s laid for her. she retrieves the gun from the floor, inspecting it quizzically as it rests in her hands. finally, she glances back up to him.]

What’s the price tag on something like this?

Price tag for something like that is the usual. What other people would ask for theirs. 200 to 400. As much as I'd like to just donate freely, you see, I got only one way to make the ammunition for it. And unless y'all decide to kill a livin' breathin' soul, which is what I'm guessin' you're aiming to avoid, that's how you're gonna get ammo for it.

But if times get desperate, then, yeah. You can knock someone off, thing'll refill another thirty rounds. Ten in a Hand Cannon. [He opens his coat, pointing out the holstered weapon there. His own pistol, Trust.] Twenty in an auto-rifle.

You want one of those bigger items, though, I'm gonna have to ask for 1000 and good heavy supplies. And keep in mind, Sister. I can make somethin' made to take out everything from behomoths to tanks to the children of gods. You want somethin' big to take on a giant AI? I can manage that.

[He's already on decent terms with a giant AI back home. Enough that he could pick at its nanotech safely.]

That's as cheap as I can go. The bigger price comes in that I really wanna find out how it's pickin' people out of its universes. I've only managed to reach two, but I'm betting I could figure out how that mess works.

[He sounds utterly confident in it, but with little bravado. That casual sort of goal driven confidence. He's set his sights on something and he wants it. He'll storm through whatever he needs to to get to it or die trying. And he'll die again, and again, and again, and keep trying. His ghost has made a relentless monster of him. But a monster that, at this moment, has no ill-will towards anyone here.]

[being a monster doesn’t make you a bad person by definition. nick struggled with that for a long time, until - with help from the other monsters she’d befriended along the way - she came to understand that even monsters have a choice to be something other than a force of chaos and destruction and pain. and she made her choice.]

There has to be some kinda device that’s bringing us here. I’ve seen it before - twice, actually. [that’s part of her story, one she’ll eventually tell him, if he still has a mind to listen.] We just don’t know where it is, or what it is we’re lookin’ for. I’m not the one running things, so I can’t make any promises, but I’ll do what I can to make sure you get what you’re asking for.

[she stares down at the gun in her hands again, not entirely sure what to make of it.]

Can you show me how this works, or does that cost extra?

Yeah, I can give you the rundown.

[He moves up beside of her, and rather than taking the gun from her hands he guides her fingers and the weapon into place.]

This is how you hold it.

Now this? This is the safety. This is the magazine. You pop it out like this- and then it'll absorb a light brick -and then you'll pop it back in. No reloads at the moment, though.

[Up closer, he smells much more like a mechanic. The more that he shows wear in his face, from things that happened before he found immortality, one must guess considering that he heals without scars.]

Then you aim and shoot. I just wouldn't recommend it in here. You probably couldn't kill an iteration, but you could kneecap one with this and slow it the hell down.

[she expects the showing to be more visual than tactile, but she doesn’t jump or shy away or even resist as he rearranges her hands to hold the gun properly. a few short years ago, she’d be yelling and threatening violence to anyone doing something as unexpected as this, immortal or otherwise, but time and her experiences have given her perspective. she’s much more selective about her battles now, much less volatile at heart.

and it’s been a while since anyone’s been this intentionally close to her - something she genuinely misses, something from before her life turned topsy-turvy. that auto shop scent is impossible to miss with him standing this close to her, and she finds herself smiling softly in recognition of it, remembering how she used to come home from working at her uncle’s garage with a similar smell lingering in her hair. even at the front desk, it was impossible to escape. she now smells faintly like plain soap and laundry detergent, with light traces of cigarette smoke - she stopped smoking heavily after being whisked away to a ruined city where all supplies were scarce. her fingers have calluses built up from innumerable hours playing her guitar.]

Wasn’t really planning on shooting up the place tonight. Besides, Rick’d kill me if I blasted holes in the walls. That’d be coming outta my paycheck forever.

[she laughs, almost under her breath, but her mirth is brief. she feels like she’s lying as to her intentions with the weapon, and while there are things worth lying about, that isn’t one of them.]

I’m not the one who’s gonna be using this anyway - I don’t fight with weapons. I just gotta show everyone else how, if I’m gonna sell ‘em on sending some business your way.

[her gaze flicks up from the gun in her hands to study his face; she can see better here than in the dim light of the bar. what battles has he fought, she wonders, that left such permanent reminders on his skin?]

Thanks. I’ve never seen anything like this before ... I guess this is where people who know more about weapons would say it’s a work of art, huh?

[At least he intends the approach to be earnest, not invasive. Not that creepy, meandering sort of wander that hands can do when the person behind them is foolish enough to make a move on someone they barely know. His hands are the hands of a mechanic and a fighter, and they move like he wants to teach, not to rule over.]

[She does smell nice, though.]

Maybe'd give you an excuse to learn to plaster, huh? Might as well avoid it. This'd cut a chunk in some brick.

[He sighs, though.]

Nah. It works smooth as butter, but it ain't art. Only one gun I ever make is art an' it requires a real particular part. There are definitely some prettier guns but mine? Mine are made to last and be easy to repair. Swords, too. I can make those. Best thing about swords where I'm from? They can shield you from bullets so long as they're charged up.

[nick’s spent enough time working in bars to spot a creep with wandering hands. hell, that’s a skill she learned well before she was old enough to work in a bar - the product of growing up a girl in late 20th century american society. she can read nothing of that sort of intent in drifter, and it’s ... refreshing.]

Don’t really know much about art, either. Music, though? I could talk your ears off about that. Not like in the “I went to a fancy expensive school to learn how to read and compose music” kinda way ... just from listening. Playing and singing too, but mostly listening.

[the diy method, self-teaching. partly out of necessity, partly because nick’s always been stubbornly independent, wearing the claim that she doesn’t need anyone else like a badge of honor.]

Where you’re from sounds like a real trip. How’d you learn to make stuff like this?

Makes sense. Everything I learned I learned from scratch or watchin' people, about the same as havin' an ear for music.

[He steps away, taking a good look at how the gun fits in her hands. Yeah, that'll work just fine.]

Well, some of this knowledge I had to make a few unfriendly deals for, just to be around the right people to give it to me. Good thing was it kept me alive. Bad thing was it goes around with me. Probably will until my dying day, until someone figures out how to put a God back in it's damn hole.

[Alright, he's a little bitter.]

Then a few other fellas picked me to learn their mess. I didn't want 'em, but they found me 'worthy' against my will. The reason I've been around so long is 'cause the Traveller picked me as one of its damn fighters an' I wanted nothin' to do with it. An' hell! Looks like the Head found me worthy too. Guess I'm a popular guy.

[He goes to settle down on her couch, plopping lazily onto it and spreading his hands, and his face is set to irate at his inability to cling to his own fate.]

But I've been alive long enough and made enough damn deals to understand how univeral portals and pocket dimensions work. So if your crew is lookin' to get out, at least head to somewhere better even if not get home? I think we should do ourselves some favors.

[he has such an interesting way of speaking, and nick finds herself drawn into the cadence of his voice, the way his words wind around and sideways and back again. she spends much of her time at work listening to people talk about themselves, and it’s not that she flat-out doesn’t care or pay attention - what they have to say usually just doesn’t stick with her. not the case with drifter.]

I’m sure we could use your expert know-how on all the dimension-hopping stuff. There’s a couple of us who’ve been tossed around a few times, but I think I’ve done it the most, and I don’t really know a lot about how it works, y’know?

[this is the second stop for at least one other kid in the rag-tag group of revolutionaries. but he wasn’t interested in figuring out the mechanics of how they were brought here as much as he wanted to simply strongarm his way back home, by any means possible.]

You said that you wanted to hear about the places I’ve been before I ended up here. If you wanna hang out for a while, I can tell you about it - if I can ask you two questions. The first one’s pretty easy - d’you want something to drink? [she grins, a little lopsided.] My menu’s not quite as extensive as the one downstairs, but I’ve got a few things on tap.

Yeah. I figured if I helped y'all out in what you wanna do, you could help me get at whatever roadmap the Head is using to get to people.

[He crosses his legs lazily, one ankle up near his knee and he scratches at the scruff on his cheek, along one of the scars that he's had for a full damn millennia but can't rightly say where he got the things.]

But yeah. Tell me about 'em. I could stand to learn somethin'.

[He's listening, even if he's looking damn casual about it now. Just merrily relaxing for the moment 'cause he knows moments where you're allowed soft furniture and a good story are fleeting. Always somethin' about to beat down the door. Hell, could just be an empty stomach starting to complain. Just give that a moment.]

[she nods gently and heads toward the couch, carefully placing the gun on the coffee table after double checking that the safety’s still on before she takes a seat on the couch next to drifter. she frowns in thought for a moment, then returns her full attention to the man sat next to her.]>

Let me know if you change your mind about that drink, yeah? [she really doesn’t know how he’ll react to her main question, so maybe that will make for a necessary distraction.] What I wanted to ask - and if this is too personal, just tell me to fuck off, I know we just met an’ all - but I was curious, since it sounds like, from what you said, that you didn’t really have a say in what happened to you. [and neither did nick.] So ... if you take out the part where you have to keep going through dying and getting hurt and coming back from it ... other than that, do you like living as long as you have? Or do you get tired of it eventually?

[she inhales a sharp breath and quickly adds:] I’m not askin’ just to be a nosy bitch or anything, I just - I haven’t met a lot of people who can talk about this from experience, and I’d kinda like to know what to expect from what I have ahead of me.

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