at sunrise we'll all dance the hempen jig [closed]

[cava]

Who: Cain and Jin (and J??)
When: Friday, May 9
Where: Sullivan's, some Irish pub in Locke
What: Drinking, dinner, echo discussion, alternative energy sources, friendly murder threats?

[Cain was early. Not only that, but he'd skipped the goggles for once. He'd gotten a booth ready, and along with the bread and beer, had some mozzarella sticks brought out. He didn't normally eat very much, and from that he figured a little indulgence couldn't hurt. Besides, he thought, it'd be simple leave plenty to offer to Jin.

He'd sat a messenger bag next to him on his side of the booth. As the seconds ticked by, he glanced at his phone to check the time. Cain was hardly about to complain if Jin didn't show, but that would rather defeat the point of the exercise. Enetron, Energon, whatever label and form it was going to take, it was vital for all four of them. Maybe five, if his sister would just remember. He didn't have the connections or the expertise to produce the stuff himself, nor did he have any vested interest in keeping it out of Jin's hands! It only made sense to bring him on for this. After all, what choice did he really have?

Being dependent on Jin for a supply, on the other hand...now, in the long term, that simply couldn't fly. But he'd cross that bridge when he came to it.]

Comments

[amajin]

[It's not like he doesn't feel bd, being this suspicious of a guy who clearly... doesn't remember having essentially murdered him. He sighs.]

Yeah, all right, you got me. I guess I should spill the beans on how, uh... How things rolled out, so the way I'm treating you makes a little more sense.

I get it. But, uh, about the business in March. You know, when you, uh. Transformed? About that.

[He hasn't had an echo about it, which actually surprises him, but the only reason he can think of that Cain could transform into that Red Buster form would be due to the backup card sucking data from Hiromu, the erstwhile Red Buster.]

Hell, I don't know how to put this. You know why you could transform, don't you? Your backup...

[cava]

[He listens to Jin as he talks, takes in what he's saying. The connections begin to form, and he tenses briefly as an Echo strikes.]

Red Buster, ouais. I'd considered the possibility, but... [He trails off, sucking in air through his teeth before frowning slightly. This was a bit heavy.]

[amajin]

[It's about to get a lot heavier. He breathes in a deep sigh.]

Well, uh... I guess he was Enter's backup...

[To be honest, since he recalled most of the major circumstances of his own past life and begun to think of that guy as the same as him, it had gotten harder to think of Cain and Enter as separate people. Still...]

[He flags the waitress down and asks, a bit desperately, for a shot of rum.]

Okay, yeah, so. Hiromu, right? Since the card that had Enter's backup on it was inside him, ah... Enter would never truly die until Hiromu did.

[He drums his fingers on the table's surface.]

And he was getting stronger and stronger, with that ability to transform and all. There were other things he was doing that made it a bigger deal, but I haven't remembered all of them. But, like...

[The waitress comes with his rum and he looks down at the shot.]

At times I could get him. Enter. You know, I programmed AIs and he was an AI, just... One that was given parameters and goals that it could never fully function within... Ah...

[He takes the shot.]

But he had to go down... And we weren't gonna let Hiromu go down, too. You understand...?

[cava]

[As this goes on, Cain considers stopping Jin. It should go without saying that since he expected them not to hold Enter's actions over his head, it should work the same in reverse.

Then the exact way that Jin is phrasing this starts to sink in, and his face hardens.]

I understand perfectly fine. Both the letter of what you're saying to me - which I can't fault, make no mistake - and the threat you insist on dancing around.

[He drums his fingers, trying not to get angry at Jin. At least, not outright. Cain downs the rest of his beer, murmuring a string of sacres before he roughly puts the bottle back onto the table.]

I may use words as a snare, Masato, but in a serious situation, I prefer it when people say what they mean.

[amajin]

[He blanches lightly. He wasn't even thinking about that, but he can't deny that his intentions have flavored the way he's speaking. He curls his hand around his half-full beer.]

That's not what I- All right, fine, look. If you go full Enter on us, and I mean full Enter... I will not hesitate to take you down, too.

[It's a lie. He doesn't want to have to kill anyone, least of all this sorry son of a bitch. Cain is a pain in the ass, but he's not... He just isn't Enter.]

But that's not what I was getting at...

[He glares broodily into his beer, frustrated at the amount of serious he's having to be right now. But Yoko was right, when she got on his case during his heart-to-heart with her... He can't keep lying, whether by omission or otherwise. And Cain is just... Well, he's essentially the closest thing to family that he can understand.]

I was trying to say that... Hiromu was just a kid. Just a dumb idiot kid, you know? I couldn't let him die. I couldn't let... Yoko... or Ryuuji die because I was too scared to just pull the goddamn trigger, you know?

[He bites his lip, bitter, frustrated. Really feeling the loss he went through over all those missing, lonely years, for the first time since the echo hit him.]

I mean, I was already...

[He sighs and puts his forehead in his hands.]

This is not getting any easier...

[He whispers, wishing for another shot.]

[cava]

[Cain curses under his breath at his own rash stupidity.]

I expected you and your daughter not to equate me with Enter, and I'd be a fool not to expect it to work both ways. I don't have any desire to be him. [Technically true. He wants it both ways.]

He had to be stopped, any idiot could understand that.

[He slouches forward and steeples his fingers briefly, letting his hands slide up his face and back through his hair. Cain takes in a deep breath before he speaks again, quietly and tinged with something between bitterness and a laugh. Suddenly, he just feels so tired.]

Heille! Àweille donc, Jin. Another round, my treat?

[amajin]

[He groans.]

The problem is... I just... The more echoes I get back, the more I can see that Masato Jin and Jin Aznable are pretty much the same guy. In a lot of ways... I mean, I guess I'm a lot more honest with my feelings than he is, or whatever.

[Not that a lot more honest than Masato Jin is really all that honest at all. Still.]

I mean, I figured you knew Enter would probably end up... badly. But it's not going to... tell the same story if you don't get that I...

[He's interrupted by a string of French he doesn't understand. He answers with a weary smile, in Japanese.]

まあ、いいじゃないか。If you're treating...

[cava]

[Cain's Japanese is shit. He's yonsei, and from an already bilingual city at that, he spoke French at home with his mother, but...

He'd picked up enough to grasp something as basic as this, especially living where he does. He isn't that sure of his syntax, but...]

もちろん、私はここにあなたを招待、ね？ It's on me, naturally. [he stumbled over that a little. oh well. and sure enough, when the server comes back around he calls for two more dark beers and two shots of rum.]

[amajin]

招待した。

[He corrects, with a smirk.]

You forgot the verb. That's okay, my shitty weird-ass Canada French is nonexistent.

[He smiles and nods at the server, and then sighs and runs his fingers through his hair.]

I just... Don't want to have to deal with this at all, really. But man. This shit goes pretty deep, that's all. I think you deserve to know.

[cava]

It's nothing I hadn't stopped to consider. But... I appreciate it. [he sighs, shifting slightly in his seat.] Commiseration helps, communication is key, there's very little that I can say here that wouldn't add a stack of clichés to this conversation. [a beat.]

Thank you. [and he laughs again, still as dry as before. Appearances are one thing, but Jin knows more about him than a lot of people. And considering the setting...to hell with it. his hand goes up to his mouth as he grins, no mirth to it.] This is so fucked.

[amajin]

[He sighs.]

Yeah. It's fucked. It's fucked, and it's nobody's fault.

[He rubs his face.]

I mean. Here's the deal, and the thing that I don't really know how to say. You and m- Enter and Masato Jin, that is... They went down together. Masato sacrificed himself to take Enter down without having to kill Hiromu. And that's... like.

[He shakes his head, shrugging with an unamused smile. It's more like a grimace, really.]

That's something I don't want to have to do again. Either part.

[cava]

Then as far as that goes, we're in agreement. [He doesn't know what to say to Jin here that he hasn't already said. He doesn't know what he could say that could make any of this any easier to deal with. If he did, he wouldn't be having the same problem as Jin.]

[amajin]

Then as long as we're clear...

[He looks aside, behind himself. ]

Where the hell are those drinks?

[He changes the subject with a calculated swiftness.]

Hey, so Yoko graduates soon, right.

[There's a quiet desperation in that admission, which, if he were thinking about it, he would realize is the first time he's said it aloud not to Yoko herself.]

[cava]

Does she? Good, good. [Cain isn't entirely sure where Jin is going with this.] Does she have a shortlist of schools? I can only assume, but...

[aah, there are those drinks.]

[amajin]

Yeah, she's just...

[He shrugs]

I mean with everything going on around here, she can't really leave town for school, which limits her options, really. But she's demanding to move to the dorms which is killing me...

[He sighs and takes a pull of his beer.]

But I mean, I've been trying to get ahold of a yellow VW bug for her. As a graduation present, you know. Maybe birthday, too, ha ha.

[cava]

[He listens, taking a drink from his own.]

With something like that, rolling it together would only be fair. But a yellow Volkswagen, honestly? [he's trying not to laugh too much.] Tabarnac, it would be a dad joke on wheels, Jin!

[amajin]

Hey, hey, hey! Bugs are cool!!

[He slams the beer down and points his finger into Cain's face]

And my daughter loves bugs, so she is gonna love this car! Plus they're pretty safe. I dunno, what kind of a first car did you have, Mr. Oh-so-high-and-mighty??

[cava]

[He just sorta backs up a ltitle, glancing between Jin's face and that finger. Are you serious rn, Jin.]

I didn't say it was a bad idea, but the sense of humor behind it...

[amajin]

Oh, right, the pun. Well, she's my kid, so maybe she's all right with it being a little bit lame. I mean, don't look a gift horse in the mouth, right?

[He clears his throat.]

A-anyhow... You, uh, you got any plans for the summer.