nightlogs | Everything It Seems I Like's a Little Bit Harmful for Me [Open to All]

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Everything It Seems I Like's a Little Bit Harmful for Me [Open to All]

Who: Dan Sagittarius and you!
What: Dan tools around in the workshop and tests the limits of North's homeowner safety compliance, makes some presents for people, acts helpful.
Where: The Workshop and outdoors near the kitchen.
When: Early October
Warnings/Notes: The usual warnings associated with Dan - alcoholism, drug use, swearing, potential references to dead children, sex work and/or firearms. Lots of nicotine addiction in this one.

Dan hates the cold.

He fucking hates the cold, because his circulation has gone to shit and sucking down cigarettes all his life has left him with a permanent sensitivity to chill along with an inconvenient and unpleasant nicotine addiction, and that combination, here at the North Pole, means he has to run a regular gauntlet throughout the day to go on smoke breaks outdoors. Instead of just popping outside to take a leisurely break from whatever he's doing, he suits up with gloves and coats and hats like he's putting on armor for battle and then houses each cigarette in record time, shivering and wincing the entire time.

When he isn't on smoke breaks and isn't running around with Bunny on missions, he's recuperating from whatever adventure he's been on by working with the elves in the workshop. Dan's father was a carpenter, a tailor and a woodworker who expressed his affection in showering his wife and seven children with gifts and attention. Dan inherited that, and he fills his idle hours with woodworking and sewing, making Christmas gifts for the people at the Pole who've been pulled into this adventure, mostly practical things like warm socks and step stools, but sometimes just tchotchkes like carved effigies. He's excited that North apparently had a bevy of goose down, and is starting to piece together cozy coats for people, and he's been building various hurdles and tunnels for Cammie to test her holon on.

Throughout the day he tries to think of a way to not be colossally rude while smoking indoors. It's poor form to light up under someone's roof and make everything reek of tobacco, and it feels all the more inconsiderate to do so in the Pole, where the merriment is unilaterally pretty child-friendly in a way cigarettes are not, and even more rude to do so while the homeowner is in captivity. Still, after a particularly frozen smoke break where he returned to warmth with his hands so near-paralyzed and bone-white that it took over an hour to get back to doing his woodwork, he decides that North would be understanding, and decides to undo the smoke detector in the kitchen. After all, the kitchen is ventilated, and smoking in here just during the coldest part of the night isn't too harmful.

I. These Are Just a Couple of My Cravings

Most things in the world are made for adult men slightly taller than Dan, but most things at the Pole are made for North and the yetis, and that means Dan can't just accomplish his goals by standing on tip toes. On account of the elves constantly getting into things they shouldn't and causing accidents, the kitchen is equipped with a smoke detector, which is about eleven feet off the ground. Standing on the highest shelf of a ladder, Dan can just barely scrape the corner of it with his fingertips. His only hope of reaching it is to jump, which may be unwise, but the siren song of nicotine has been known to wreck many a man on its rocks.

"Hey, do you mind holding this ladder while I try to reach this?" he asks the next person to come in.

II. A Little Bit Sweeter

By a few days in, Dan's got a straight-up workspace in the workshop, a table festooned with the tools of his crafts. Right now, it's covered in fabric and threads and scissors and rulers and a mannequin and all the deadwood of tailoring and mending as he works on a big, puffy coat to swaddle Elle in. He's at a frustration point, because at some juncture he fucked up the circumference of the sleeves, and he's realizing that his error might be so serious as to necessitate scrapping the coat entirely. He's chewing his nails in annoyance at himself when someone comes in, and he pounces on the opportunity to distract himself with some new task.

"Hey, you need anything mended? The tailor's open for business right now."

III. So Please Be Kind If I'm a Mess

The second Dan's cigarette is burned down, he rushes back into the communal relaxation room, teeth chattering and hands tucked into his armpits. Snowflakes dot his hair, and his cheeks are flush red. He strips off his gloves, and his fingers are a mix of angry red and bloodless white. He hastens over to the fireplace and groans as the transition from too-cold to too-hot makes his hands cramp, then reaches for the rice pack he set over the fire to warm up without having to hunch over the flames.

"Oh God damn it," Dan mutters, as his clumsy-with-cold hands fumble the rice pack and drop it straight into the fire. He huffs with frustration as he gets the fire poker and tries to retrieve the rice pack, but by now the pack is decidedly on fire, looking like a burning baked potato. "I owe North some rice."

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Well, that wasn't an unwelcome surprise. Speaking more than one language wasn't uncommon back home, but that doesn't seem to be the case in Dan's dimension. Clearly, his conversation partner was being deceptively humble about himself. Dan knew where the fun drinks were, and had some other secrets about him? The annoyed tension lines of Miguel's face ease up with interest.

"Ya veo. Si estas repleto de sorpresas." he replies with a lighter breeze in his voice. "¿Me vas a decir el cuento de cómo aprendistes hablar así?"

His spoken cadence has the influence of the city and a hundred years of time between them, leaving it fairly "neutral". Closer to what might be heard on television rather than any particular region.

(( * I see. You really are full of surprises. Are you going to tell me the story of how you learned to speak like that? ))

"Ghost-hunting takes me along the whole of the West Coast of North America. And I had a loved one who helped me practice conversations."

Dan doesn't particularly want to talk about Ellie, much less with a stranger, but he has plenty of stories of hunting ghosts in Acapulco and Ensenada. He listens for Miguel's accent, but he supposes that it must just be Nueva York or the century of difference because it doesn't quite track to any location in particular.

"I speak French, American sign language and Common Tongue, too. I pick up languages like fleas. I'm shooting for Mandarin next."

"Fuistes demasiado modesto al describirte, Dan. ¿Entonces una carera de traductor no te interesaba mucho?"

Miguel had leaned forward, resting his face in his hand to get a closer look at him. As if observing him like a simulation graph would reveal all his secrets.

It was a... dry attempt at a friendly tease. Really, since when did someone associate Hickness with knowing five languages? To which ever degree Dan knew them. He supposes it would be handy for talking to ghosts.

*((You were being too modest while describing yourself, Dan. So being a Translator didn't interest you much?))

He recognizes the tease for what it is, and keeps meeting it back with amiability. He's glad Miguel feels like Dan can be teased. Assuming Dan were too brittle for it would be a mistake.

"I get pulled into translating on ghost hunts pretty regularly, but I got other limitations that keep me from making translating my main means of income."

He guesses that's opaque enough that it doesn't completely tip his hand that he's illiterate, but maybe Miguel can read between the lines. Dan suspects that just about no one's illiterate in Miguel's time; the march of technology seems to always demand more and more fluency, more and more tech-savvy, and people like Dan's get left behind with their dirt roads and well-water and barter economies. Dan suspects Miguel can see it on him, the battered hands, the much-patched clothing, the imprecise haircut Dan gave himself to save a few dollars, the peek of scar under his lower lip that shines in the firelight, the missing tooth that only shows when he grins - all the visual evidence of a life held together with both hands and a prayer.

"I think my hands are warmed up enough that I could pour us each a glass of rum, if you were still interested in that."

"Si te gustan tus respuestas crípticas."

* (( You do like your mysterious answers. ))

Whether or not Miguel guesses it to be illiteracy and feels shocked by it remains his own mystery. He could already gleam that Dan had lived far more on the fringes than he had. Miguel wasn't that much younger when the hand of Alchemax and the Powers-That-Be were more strict about keeping unwanted individuals in the undercity, out of sight.

Miguel's face is briefly illuminated by the artificial orange of the world-hopping watch as he consults it - still busted on the dimension travel front - but functional enough to keep time. He stands up off the chair.

"Quizás un traguito. Debería regresar a mi trabajo."

* (( Perhaps a sip. I should be getting back to my work. ))

“You’re not the only one who can be brooding and mysterious.” Dan’s grin betrays that this is also dry teasing. “I don’t read or write well. People tend to want that in a translator.”

He gets up, feeling stiff from the cold and then the heat, and starts to collect his layers from where he shed them.

“I won’t keep you long, then. What task is calling your name right now? Anything exciting?”

Edited 2023-11-17 05:17 (UTC)

"Hm."

Smiles don't come so easily to him (aside from the prickly sarcastic kind) but he accepts the accusation gracefully. How could Miguel deny his very vampire-like demeanor?

As for the revelation... he acknowledges it without comment. It's unusual, but in the grander scheme of the multiverse, not quite so much. One of them would have to read the fine print if they were out on the field. That's what it meant in practicality.

"Sigo armando el laboratorio. Con suerte, la computadora será suficientemente poderosa para hacer las simulaciones de física necesarias."
* (( Still setting up the lab. With luck, the computer will be powerful enough to do the necessary physics simulations. ))

Miguel is slated to be spending many afternoons organizing cables into ribbons and sleeves. He offers a hand with the clothes.

"Much appreciated." Dan takes the clothes and wears some of them, drapes the others over his arm like a butler with a kerchief. "Have you met Cammie? She's a teenager her, real technological genius, is what I understand. The kind of prodigy that lets you catch up to experienced adults in the field when you're still a kid. My understanding is she does a lot with simulations. She might be worth talking to about what you can do when you get the computer ready."

He hopes he isn't hyping Cammie up too much when he truly barely understands a tenth of the tech jargon she uses, but he's fairly sure she's an exceptional talent based on all his context clues. Either way, the warmth and fondness he has for her is all over his face and even his flat, ugly, atonal voice.

He gestures with his chin in the direction they should walk, which is through two kitchen room doors to a side pantry, where North keeps his alcoholic beverages. In true fashion, most are either cooking sherries or top-shelf vodkas, but Dan uncovers some expensive white rum tucked into the back.

"Do you prefer on-the-rocks or taking it straight?" Dan pulls some glasses out. He thinks Miguel looks like an on-the-rocks guy for rum, but that's all just an assumption. "I've come to enjoy putting fresh snow in my liquor instead of ice. Feels like taking advantage of a climate otherwise hostile to me."

He laughs. "But I ain't going back out in the cold just yet, so that's a suggestion, not an offer."

"El meka en el piso central es de ella, no? Le pregunto si está interesada in trabajando juntos - los simulaciones pueden ser una tarea tedioso."

((* The mech on the central floor is hers, isn't it? I’ll ask if she’s interested in working together - the simulations may be tedious work. ))

He has some awareness of Cammie's existence, but he hasn't gotten to known her much personally. He looks pensive at the suggestion - Miguel has been surrounded by enough teenage braniacs to work around brilliant but short attention spans. He’ll have to determine the extent of that when they get there.

Following Dan to the pantry, he makes an impressed hum in his chest at seeing some of the selection sequestered away.

"Tenía la sensación de que escondieron algo de mayor calidad por ahí.” He says with some bemusement. “Puedo buscar el puñado de nieve, si tienes antojo."

(( * I had a feeling they hid something of higher quality somewhere. I can go fetch the fistful of snow if you fancy that. ))

"Yeah, that's hers. I figure she'll be excited to talk to someone who can keep up with her tech terminology. I'm sure I disappoint her a little in that regard."

But Dan doesn't sound sad or self-conscious about that. He knows Cammie likes him for other reasons, and that she's happy to have someone listen to her enthuse and encourage her even with imperfect understanding.

"When in doubt, you can always count on me to sniff out the high quality liquor." If Miguel can tell Dan's a functional alcoholic, well, he can join the club with everyone else. "I don't need snow if you don't. I'm happy to just follow your lead. I've enjoyed getting to know you."

His chin lifts slightly, battling a needling paranoid suspicion of whether or not Dan was actually enjoying his company, or just trying to be nice. But he supposes he wouldn't get to see this little secret if he wasn't. Miguel clearly wasn't much the type for platitudes, in no rush to return the compliment.

"Con hielo, pues."
(( * On the rocks, then ))

His eyes flick to the bottle, watching the process of pouring the drinks. It was no fault of Dan's really, something within Miguel pressed him to watch what was put in the glass for his own comfort. It's... been a while since he's tolerated something like this from someone else.

Edited 2023-11-23 07:14 (UTC)

Dan doesn't take it personally that the compliment isn't returned. He meant it, and a compliment that's only fishing for its mirror is an insincere one. Miguel may be reserved, but he's been interesting and, Dan expects, about as close to friendly as Miguel gets.

Such an expectation is why Dan not only doesn't hide what he's doing with his hands, but subtly tilts so that they're easier for Miguel to see, which he hopes isn't obvious. He wants Miguel to feel comfortable. He doesn't want Miguel to think he's aware that he's being observed with suspicion.

The way he pours is very fluid and competent, the result less of his own dependence on alcohol and more on the fact that bartending has always been one of his go-to ways to make cash in a new town. He gives Miguel a medium pour, himself a heavy one. When he's bothering to delude himself, he claims he needs more alcohol than usual because it buffers him from the worst of the Pole's climate.

"Do we toast to the future or the past today?"

"Nada bueno viene de pensar demasiado del pasado."

( * Nothing good comes from thinking too much about the past. )

This was from my personal stock. 1994 was an excellent year.

Dan's hands move more gracefully than expected, given he was halfway to a frozen statue a short time ago. Yes. Bartending would make sense for someone so well-versed in conversation and easy to get along with. For when languages came easy, but academia not so much.

Taking the glass once its poured, the scent fills his nose with strong notes. It smelled only like rum. It was pleasant. Miguel wonders if he'd be able to tell otherwise, even with gene-modded senses. He decides to wait for Dan to take the lead on the toast.

"I can't argue with that."

Dan's already figured that Miguel has something dark lurking in his past - quite simply, the powers that be don't make Guardians out of people who haven't gotten tossed around by life - so this doesn't come as any sort of surprise to him. It's not that he isn't curious; it's just that Dan doesn't think his eagerness to know what experiences formed Miguel should trump Miguel's comfort, so he doesn't ask.

He considers what sort of toast to propose. He doesn't think Miguel seems receptive to some chummy salute to a new friendship. He wonders if Miguel feels optimistic about the future, if for no reason besides that it, being an unknown quantity, isn't the past, a known and sad quantity.

"To your work with the computers and mine with the sewing and carpentry. And whatever other skills and pursuits we'll dedicate ourselves to."

He takes a drink.

The toast of choice seems to sit well with Miguel, despite whatever was haunting him. He exhales to relax himself, soundless but visible in the way his shoulders slackened.

“Siempre puedo contar en tener trabajo por hacer.” he adds, with a little rise of his glass. “Salud.”

(( * I can always count on having work left to do. Cheers. ))

He does take his sip, after seeing Dan drink with nothing afoul happening. He notices that Dan served himself quite a lot. There’s a wrinkle between his brows at tasting the drink itself, the slight discomfort of something strong hitting the attuned taste and smell. Nothing happens. That seems to be when whatever fear was nibbling at his base stem settles himself, and he can try to enjoy what he agreed to.

He takes another mouthful, closing his eyes. The taste hits him more than the effect of the alcohol.

The alcohol’s strong, but Dan’s inured. He may as well be drinking water for all the reaction he has, nothing but a look of mild satisfaction. White rum isn’t his favorite; he’s always preferred alcohol that was sugary and syrupy, but sharing a drink with someone is one of those irenic oases from the stress of life.

Periodically, he watches Miguel’s shadow and reflection in the window instead of Miguel under the guise of just observing his surroundings, but actually keeping an eye on Miguel’s body language. He sees both the tension and the release, so he isn’t surprised when he looks up and Miguel’s eyes are closed in a brief moment of respite.

“So, what do you get up to when you ain’t working?”

“Nada impresionante.”

(( *Nothing exciting. ))

Since they were sharing their bad habits with each other, now it was time for Miguel to reveal more of his. He looks downwards at the drink, as if trying to gleam some secret prophecy from its surface. He had barely nursed it beyond the first two sips.

“Jamás hay tiempo libre cuando te involucras demasiado en el multiverso.”

( * There is barely any free time when you involve yourself in the multiverse too much. )

Which… didn’t sound dull, but if the way Miguel seemed none too excited about the matter gave any hints - his relationship with the work was looking a lot more like a self-built cage than something he enjoyed.

“Y no es algo que puedes dejar sin más.”

(* And it isn’t something you can just quit. )

Dan weighs the possibility of opining that people work better when they have hobbies to break up the work, but it really isn't his place to tell Miguel how to accomplish his goals better. Miguel didn't ask Dan.

"Would you, if you could?"

He goes through his drink a bit more quickly than Miguel, although he doesn't drain it. Were he by himself, he probably would.

"Just curious if it's an affair of passion or obligation or both or sometimes one, sometimes the other."

“No.”

There is a slight scratch of the counter against talons, like a pensive tap of the fingertips. They flick back in as soon as he feels the woodgrain on the nerves.

“No se puede huir así.”

( * There is no running away like that. )

The restless hand closes into a loose fist, to keep the sharp ends from touching countertop. They seem to fold in naturally against his palm.

“También creo que me costaría volver a una vida normal. Así es.”

(* I also think I’d have a hard time adjusting back to a normal life. It is what it is. )

Much more of the rum disappears down his throat, this time.

Edited 2023-11-27 01:02 (UTC)

Dan hears the scratch on the counter but doesn't look; he feels like he knows what that sound is from working so much with werewolves and hellcats, and that if Miguel had wanted to demonstrate that he had weapons in his fingers, Miguel would have. He just files it away as useful information.

"That didn't answer my question."

But Dan's gentle smirk makes it clear that he isn't going to press for that answer. He watches the level of the rum in the glass go down; so does his own.

"My normal life is laying spirits to rest across the continent and I've been told that learning to shoot a gun when you're still in diapers is unusual, so I don't think I know what 'normal' actually is."

For how even-to-annoyed Miguel’s range of expressions were when he talked, it certainly made the incredulous pinch of his face stand out all the more. No, Dan’s upbringing was nothing like what he knew.

But the smirk manages to soften his expression some, and he looks away.

“I miss the idea of only worrying about a desk job. Having room for other things, without worrying if it’ll all be destroyed if you look away too long.”

He switches back to English, as if to better express the banal stakes of dealing with Alchemax’s paper-pushing kind of evil.

“Solo es una fantasía mía. I think if I went back to that now, I’d be terrible at putting up with it.”

(( * It’s just a fantasy of mine. ))

He already knew he made a lousy family man. And there were some changes that weren’t easily undone - as the edge of the thumbclaw on closed palm reminded him.

“It sounds stupid when I say it out loud.”

"I don't remember the last time I wasn't worried that any good thing I had might be destroyed if I looked away too long."

Dan shrugs and finishes his drink of rum. He doesn't pour himself more, although he considers it; he would if not for the company. He's being honest. Everything good that he has - and at this point, it's quite a few things - feels ephemeral, almost like he's under some sort of spell that's about to break. He doesn't trust it to be there each morning when he wakes up.

He would never tell Bunny that he hates when Bunny goes on adventures and leaves him to wake up alone and convince himself that everything's fine by himself. He would never tell the teens here that each time he sees them he walks himself through what it would feel like to drink through their funerals. But it's there under the surface. Dan believes the world is beautiful and good and that each person has so much potential worth nurturing. He has optimism, and yet he's always, always braced for the worst.

"You can join me in the ranks of those who couldn't put up with a desk job. The idea almost makes me break out into hives." Dan laughs and falls back out of Spanish. "Lots of things sound stupid out loud. Don't mean that they're stupid in our heads. Just means it gets fouled up in translation to our tongues."

“Hm.” the noise of puzzlement follows Dan’s laugh, Miguel looking at him with a much flatter line on his mouth.

“Es impresionante cómo puedes decir cosas tan deprimentes y amables al mismo tiempo.“

(( * It's impressive how you can say such bleak and kind things in the same breath. ))

Miguel seems unconvinced that Dan’s outlook worked, even for Dan. All it took was one rogue brick in his order of things to quickly bring a catastrophic spiral that he’s barely forced a pause on. Watch and wait. Hope things don’t explode again - be ready to leap into action if it does. It’s been… dubiously successful.

He finds ice and a residual drip of mostly melted water at the bottom of his glass. Be it through simple size or altered biology, he was going to need a lot more of them to loosen up.

“Thank you for the drink.”

He stretches his shoulders back, as if attempting to address some unseen crick at the base of his neck. Leisure seemed to paradoxically make him restless.

Edited 2023-11-29 07:42 (UTC)

"I find that when things are bleak, kindness is the best route, so maybe that's why." Dan's smile turns a bit sardonic. He reaches over in an offer to take Miguel's glass from him. It was his idea to get rum, so it's his responsibility to do the cleanup.

"You're welcome. The pleasure's always mine when it comes to having company." And puzzling Miguel out has taken Dan's mind off the discomfort of the cold quite effectively. "Thanks for rescuing my sock full of rice."

Miguel seems to take sardonic well enough. That was closer to his way of bantering when he was feeling a little more light-hearted.

He lets Dan take the glass from his hand after a beat, as if those particular rules of etiquette had a few seconds of lag time from being retrieved from old memories.

“I’m limited by the technology of this century, but maybe there is a better way to keep warm if you insist on going outside.”

Taking on a side task here or there didn’t slow him down much. And sometimes, it led to unexpected discoveries.

“I’ll have to see what’s available.”

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