Dan Sagittarius (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
hallelujahjunction) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
nightlogs2023-10-12 05:19 pm
hallelujahjunction) wrote in nightlogs2023-10-12 05:19 pm
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."
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."
no subject
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.”
no subject
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."
no subject
“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.
no subject
"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."
no subject
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.”
no subject
He tucks the rum bottle back where it came from and finishes gathering the glasses. "I'll see you around. It's been nice."