bigapplesauce | So Who's Going to Watch You Die? [closed]

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So Who's Going to Watch You Die? [closed]

Daniel scans the intersection for the twentieth time in the past five minutes, hands crammed in his pockets. He's not anxious and he's certainly not fidgeting. Well. Not overly.

And if he were, hypothetically, fidgeting and shuffling and shifting in one place restlessly, it'd be completely justified given present circumstances. He's just a little on edge, mostly thanks to shared group dreams which are, apparently, possible - something he's recently discovered in the worst way imaginable. He'd been hoping all morning that leaving the apartment and interacting with the real world for a bit would brush away the last few echoes of the nightmare, but there's still a chill in his spine regardless. Expected, but no less unwelcome.

So, yes, he's a little concerned, primarily about Seth. It's true that Seth has lived here for longer - much longer - and he'd acted like he was used to the shared nightmarish experiences by now. Daniel has more than a few issues with that sentiment (the foremost being that horrible nightmares in which people get impaled and imprisoned and die should not be something one gets used to, personal history with nightmares aside) but he's also hoping Seth can clear up a few questions about the Dreaming. It might not have been real in the strictest sense of the word, but it had certainly felt like it.

Also he is worried.

That line of thought just keeps looping on back.

Daniel's phone buzzes, a text from Seth. Soon the phone returns to his pocket as he crosses his arms, takes stock of the intersection again, and waits.

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Daniel has to scramble to find a plate (who forgets to get out plates?) in time to transfer his semi-successful achievement in cooking from the pan.

"Uh." He frowns at it for a long minute before carrying it to the table. "It was supposed to be an omelet," he explains ruefully, sliding his slightly lopsided creation over to Seth. "Hopefully it, uh, tastes better than it looks?"

He returns to the stove to shuffle more bacon into the pan and re-stir the remaining egg mixture. And then give Seth a fork because he realizes a little late he forgot to include that rather necessary step in the serving process.

Seth doesn't even comment on the lack of a fork. He just sits there smiling, waiting for Daniel to realise, and grins once he finally brings it over.

It doesn't look that terrible, so Daniel is really just judging himself too harshly here. It's not the sort of fancy stuff you see in cookbooks, but it still looks like an omelet and it smells amazing.

Seth shovels up a forkful of it, blowing gently at it for a couple moments to cool it down, before finally popping it in his mouth. It's still too hot, really, but it is also good, and he makes an appreciative mmm sound.

The pan's still hot so the second omelet comes along much quicker even if it emerges no less deformed. Daniel joins Seth with his own plate and sits down opposite, watching him with cautious optimism.

"I do okay?" he asks a little too quickly. It really has been a while since he's cooked for anyone, himself included, and even with limited supplies on hand he'd been worried about the end result.

Seth is doing a bad job waiting for his food to cool properly, as it turns out he was more hungry than he thought. But then breakfast didn't happen because he was, well, high, and then he hadn't gotten around to lunch yet.

And since his mouth is currently full of food, he just nods appreciatively and enthusiastically. He swallows and gets to his feet, fetching their coffee mugs. "It's really good, thanks, mate," he says, getting the coffee pot as well to refill their cups, before sitting back down and continuing to stuff himself.

Daniel accepts the fresh coffee gratefully, then spears a bite of dubiously constructed omelet and finds that, to his surprise, he didn't do too terribly.

"Well I'm glad it turned out all right," he answers cheerfully, "though you may need to, uh, replenish your fridge." He ducks his head, apologetic, and takes the opportunity to take a much-needed swallow of coffee.

"Well, that's kind of what a refrigerator is for," Seth answers in between bites. "You know, putting in food, cooking it, eating it, and then putting in new food. Or at least so I'm told. I often skip the 'cooking' portion." And if Daniel wants to cook, Seth doesn't mind getting the paying and the restocking.

"Well, I don't mind doing step two if you don't mind steps one, three, and four," says Daniel, now eating in earnest. "Though that, um, does seem a bit disproportionate." And also weird. He's talking like this is a regular thing, which it isn't. It's Daniel making dinner for a friend out of some ridiculous sense of guilt or responsibility or however he chooses to define it, except that it's technically lunch if one takes the whole "noon" factor into account.

Yep, more coffee. That's good. Definitely more coffee.

Seth narrows his eyes a bit, considering. "Well, really it's just three steps. Getting food, cooking food, and eating food. And we're sharing responsibility on the third one, so."

And it's definitely not weird, because this is clearly just hypothetical joking.

Just like it was when they just hypothetically joking last night, fun comments that clearly nothing would come of. Yep.

"True. Very true." Impeccable reasoning, and not weird at all. Not even a little. "So that makes it much more of an even process, you know, really...really very even."

And why is he still talking even?

"Thanks for the coffee," he mumbles over a mouthful of omelet, because he doesn't trust himself to handle the current subject matter as adroitly as he'd like.

"Well, you mentioned something about being a raging caffeine addict, so," Seth answers, glancing up from his food. He's going to give himself a stomach ache, the way he's putting this away.

"And there's no alcohol in it, I promise," he adds with a smile. Probably because noon feels a little early to start in on the alcohol. As fun as it was to see Daniel kinda drunk.

"Good to know." He has missed this - actual food, actual coffee, nothing out of the Air Force's less-than-stellar commissary. It's good. He feels relaxed, even. Normalcy. He likes it. "People have tried to break me from the habit before with, uh, limited success. I did manage to break the habit once but, um. Well, it was because I was living on another planet at the time. For a year. So." He shrugs and takes another bite. "Withdrawal was my least favorite part of that whole experience."

"Yeah..." Seth answers at his food, suddenly uncomfortable with this topic. Well, he was the one who brought it up, he can only blame himself, really.

"So what was that planet like, then?" he asks, grabbing for the part of this conversation that doesn't bring up lots of unwanted comparisons reminding him of his own problems.

"Hot," he admits. "The area I was at was mostly desert. Thirty-six hour days, raging sandstorms, and a people who had until recently been under the rule of a false alien god." He sips at his coffee again, considering. "I miss it."

Seth nods sympathetically. "Well, you've come here in the middle of the heatwave. So you've got the hot part covered," he says. Though at least Seth has A/C at home, so he can justify wearing longsleeves without melting away.

"But it's not exactly dry." One of the easiest way to discover this is to try to use the stair railings on the subway. Just, slick with all the moisture in the air, and unbelievably gross. Seth's ended up showering almost every day just to not feel disgusting, living in this city at this time of year.

"Well after that I was based in Colorado Springs, so fortunately I'm no stranger to humidity. Or, I guess, unfortunately. Depending on your take." He leans back in the chair, rolling his shoulders back. "And you, you mentioned Uganda. Which, wow. What was that like?"

Daniel carefully avoids the part where Seth mentioned Uganda in a dream and mostly for the sake of keeping them both distracted while he injected Daniel full of morphine. He doesn't need to think about that.

"Dry," he answers with a small smile. "We were really only there on holiday at first, so, not very long. I was heading back down there when I came through the rift nine months ago."

"Talk about weather shifts," Daniel jokes over his coffee. "I haven't been to the New York area since I was a kid, so I'm still getting a feel for the weather. Well, more or less. It's no alien planet, at least."

"I hadn't been here ever, so," Seth answers with a shrug. He didn't really travel much until he was in his mid-twenties and actually had money for himself, and then it was to get away from the big cities, not to just go to a different one. "D'you come here on holiday or something?"

"Or something," Daniel replies vaguely. "Didn't come back after that. Or plan to, really, but I guess the Rift had other ideas."

He's being intentionally evasive, he knows, something he doesn't often do or even remotely enjoy doing. As it is, they've discussed enough sobering topics for the day and he doesn't want to get into it.

"So, how was my most recent undertaking in cooking? Turn out okay?" He winces imperceptibly even as he says it lightly because that subject shift was in no way subtle or skillful and he's pretty sure Seth knows it.

It's not exactly difficult for Seth to notice that Daniel is being evasive and changing the subject, but he doesn't pry. If it's important or relevant, he's sure he'll find out at some point.

"Mmm, excellent," he answers with a definite nod. He's completely cleared off his plate by now, which is a good enough sign. He's about to say it was almost worth breaking his back for, but no, they're trying to get away from that subject. Even if it'll probably linger for a little while.

"Don't suppose cleaning up and putting away the dishes was included in that offer?" he asks, suppressing a smirk. Hey, at least he has a dishwasher, so there's not actually much work.

"Yeah, I," he looks back over at the counter, rubbing at the back of his neck, "I kind of made a mess. Sorry about that." He downs the remainder of his coffee and grabs both plates to deposit them into the dishwasher along with bowl, pan, and spatula.

"Really has been a while since I cooked for anyone." He half-shrugs, returning the carton with its remaining eggs and the nearly depleted milk to their respective places in Seth's fridge. "But, hey - one impromptu dinner slash lunch, mishap-free."

Jeez, Daniel, give him something to work with here. Seth's teasing and he just goes ahead and does it? Which probably means Daniel is far too easy to take advantage of, and that just makes Seth feel strangely protective. Well... more protective than he already is, given how many counts of life-saving happened last night.

"You didn't set anything on fire, break anything, or poison me. Sounds like a win to me," he agrees, leaning back in his chair.

"Yet." Immediately he shuts his eyes. Ah, no. "Bad joke, sorry." Much to his relief (and confusion), Seth has just seemed mildly amused throughout the entire process, though Daniel doesn't fully understand why. It's just dinner. Lunch, even. Between two recently-acquainted friends. Who happened to save each others' lives in a dream manifestation the night before. Not a big deal.

"Well, what's the fun of dying if you can't joke about it?" Seth answers mildly, not sure if that's reassuring or not. It's meant to be. While neither of them wants to dwell on what happened (even though they seem to keep doing so), it's much easier to be flippant about it than tiptoe around and try to avoid it entirely.

Seth makes a good point. Deflecting the gravity of a situation with humor isn't Daniel's typical tactic - usually he's the first one to address it, open and unyielding and overbearing in his desire to understand, or he'll just leave it to drift quietly until someone else is ready to bring it up - but it certainly seems to be Seth's. And in the case of the dying thing, well. He gets that a little.

"What was I thinking?" He tries for a wry grin and leans back against the counter, bracing himself with both arms, but he doesn't think the expression succeeds. It feels more like a grimace. And there's that guilt again, the too-present, too-acute regret over having not done something about everything that had gone wrong in that dream. Daniel can't rationalize any of it, much as he wants to and much as Seth clearly wants to. He's been giving off the "water under the bridge" philosophy all day; if only Daniel could get the irrational parts of his brain to listen.

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