undergrounds | There's a place I know I can always go (Open)

Entry tags:

There's a place I know I can always go (Open)

It's been a while since Cesare was last in London. He had...other issues to attend to in other countries. But now that he's back, he wants to immerse himself in his surroundings. Cesare is not exactly the type of man to spend any extended period of time with strangers so voluntarily, but he wants to pick up the pulse of London again, see how it's moving nowadays. And where better to do that than on his home turf?

Cesare is lurking in a corner of a lounge at The Angelo, sitting in an armchair and sipping an Old Fashioned (the irony isn't lost on him). He doesn't look particularly remarkable, at least when compared to the hotel's typical clientèle of businessmen in suits and high flyers with a little too much time on their hands. In fact, Cesare has gone out of his way to blend in. He holds a paper as if he actually cares about standard current affairs and looks at his phone every so often as if he finds it useful and not newfangled and pointless. You would probably have to know who Cesare was to spot him. Constantly, though, he's watching.

A. Can I buy you a drink?
Eventually someone catches his eye at the bar. Are they familiar? Does Cesare know them? Perhaps. Do they just seem interesting? Just as possible.

Cesare leaves his paper on the lounge chair and sits himself down next to them. He smirks, his manner calm and collected. You're in his home. He's comfortable.

"What do you drink?"

B. What are you doing here?
Someone is here who shouldn't be. They could be an old foe who has grown over confident with Cesare's absence. They could be the wrong type of person for this type of hotel. They could simply not have paid.

Either way, they shouldn't be here. Cesare quietly makes his way up to them. When he speaks, his tone is polite and cordial but there's something slightly too piercing about his gaze and he's standing a little too close to them for comfort.

"Something tells me you might be lost."

C. Can I speak to a manager?
Someone isn't happy. In fact, they are really quite frustrated. One of the hotel staff has messed up royally and someone is demanding that they speak to a higher up about it. This needs to be fixed. Something has to be done and Cesare is happy enough to oblige. With his façade of a casual hotel guest ruined he smiles as the waiter anxiously frets.

"I'm certain that we can sort this out."

D. Pick your own adventure! Choose something else!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Natasha spends a lot of time in bars. Some are dives. Some aren't. It's not the first time she's found herself in this hotel bar, sitting at the counter and nursing a drink. Tonight it's red wine. Cliche, maybe, but she likes the texture.

She hasn't seen the owner before, and if she'd known he was in town, she probably would have found somewhere else to spend the night.

She looks down, her attention falling on polished wood rather than meet his eyes.

"Is that a trick question?"

Cesare shrugs and shakes his head.

"Not yet." There is still plenty of time for difficult questions. Right now Cesare simply wants to learn more about her. She is a vampire, he already knows that. She's under fed, he can guess that one. And she seems nervous about it, as if every question might be a charged one. Cesare smirks. She's smart.

"When was the last time you fed?" He keeps his voice just low enough so that any human patrons can't hear him. It would be unfortunate if they overheard something problematic.

"Now it's a trick question," Natasha says dryly. She's resigned to this kind of treatment. She can't say exactly how other vampires will see her, but she can guess. She knows how she would have reacted to someone in her position a few years ago. Six months ago, even; while the unease had started before that, she'd still gone through the motions.

Now, she still questioned whether going this far was necessary. She didn't trust herself to half measures yet, though. How easy would it be to backslide if she were feeding on humans again?

"A few months." She answers, because she knows that he won't count animals and because he's old enough to keep her cautious. No saying how he'd respond to an overt dodge. She'll save that for if she really needs it.

Cesare appreciates her honesty, and the fact that she already predicts he won't count her drinking animals as feeding. There is a difference between a hearty meal and snacking on leftovers. Cesare would remind her of that if he can.

He whispers something to the bartender who then pulls out a liquor bottle from the fridge. The bartenders pours two glasses of something that definitely isn't liquor and puts them on the bartop in front of them. Cesare gestures towards the drink.

"Take it. It's...cruelty free, I assure you." That is hardly one of Cesare's priorities, but sometimes acquiring blood from a willing participant is simply easier, particularly when you intend to bottle and store it. It's great how things like that work out sometimes.

Natasha's jaw tightens the moment the smell of blood hits the air. It's subtle, but not that subtle. She wasn't lying when she said it had been months since she had human blood, and if she'd thought she'd been aware of every single day of it before, with temptation on the bar in front she felt each of them like an injury.

Her hand starts to move to take the glass without conscious thought. She's old enough to have self-control, but not so old it comes that it always comes easy. Not when she's been living on pig's blood and the occasional strays in a pinch. She covers for the stumble by pulling the glass a little closer, toying with it but stopping short of raising it to her mouth.

"That's kind of you, but not really necessary."

Cesare sighs, disappointed that she would turn down his offer. In his eyes, he is simply trying to help her. The idea that she would reject his offer under some idea of morality is absurd to him. Animal blood is no way to live.

However he is far from the type to give up so easily.

"How long does it take you to heal from injury?" he asks calmly. It is not a threat but instead merely a blunt question. He knows that the more real blood you drink, the easier you heal. "A deep cut, for example. Minutes, days? Or are you practically mortal again?"

She hears a threat in the question anyway. Not overt or immediate—not the implication that he's going to do something now. There's a darkness in it though, a goading that hints at the potential for anger.

She licks her lips.

"Not quite mortal again," Natasha says with a wince. And it won't get that bad. She doesn't think it will, anyway. She's not sure. But she's felt the effects, and even she would have a hard time claiming that the weakness didn't bother her. "It takes longer than it did, but not that long. A deep cut might be a few hours."

Silently he picks up his own glass and finishes it before crushing it calmly in his hand. It crumples like paper, the shards digging into his skin and creating deep lacerations in his palm. It's a detached, low-key move, one that wouldn't draw too much attention unless someone were already looking and knew exactly what they were seeing. He holds out his hand for Natasha to see and it heals almost instantly, skin threading back together apart from in a small place where a fragment still remains. He casually pulls it out and puts it on a napkin as he speaks.

"There are some things that are integral to our being. A body craves for a reason. We both know that you are harming yourself. You cannot undo what has happened to you. Any thought as to some broken concept of morality is a long defunct. You have been given an opportunity and I suggest you do not throw it away."

"It's not morality." Her answer comes a little too quickly, with a catch in it like a scratch of some unidentified emotion. That could just be her voice, though. It's always a little husky, the kind of sound that lets people project meaning and feeling on her words that may not be there.

She forces herself to watch his hand, though her jaw tightens and her lips thin. The sight doesn't do anything to assuage her thirst. Or her nerves.

"And I'm not trying to undo what I happened." She'd been a killer years before she was turned, which in a way was part of the problem. There's a pause as she considers how to put him off. The temptation to just drink it and say it's because it's the most expedient, because it would put him off and it's not as though she'd be feeding on a human directly so it's not really defeating her goal, but she's too stubborn to listen to that voice. Instead, she says softly, "I appreciate your concern, but it's not necessary. I might be harming myself, but it's just for a while."

She's not sure if that's true, but it's not untrue either. Once she gets her head on straight, figures herself out, maybe she'll be comfortable feeding again. There's no way to know.

Natasha's logic is entirely lost on him. Morals are an excuse that Cesare can understand. They're foolish and wrong but somewhat coherent. The idea that Natasha has some other sort of reason confuses him. In his eyes, he has already crossed off the one main option for her to resist. He squints slightly and leans in towards her.

"Then what is it?" Please, enlighten him. Because quite frankly, Cesare can't think of any other possible reason for Natasha to decline his offer.

"What is your name? Do you know who I am?" He would like to know who this foolish young woman is and whether she knows who she's talking to. Cesare expects she doesn't: he has been gone for a while after all, and her behaviour suggests she doesn't know quite who he is. Few people would knowingly decline his offers so consistently.

"Natasha Romanoff," she says, answering the easiest question first. She doesn't shrink away from him and she doesn't let herself tense or flinch. She does go very still under his scrutiny, though, the way an animal might go limp to avoid a fight. When she continues, though, her attitude is perhaps less passive than he posture would imply.

The next words are in Italian, salted with a Russian accent and just as fluent as her English. "And I have a pretty good idea who you are. I didn't know you'd be here, though."

Which means that her refusals, as gentle as they are, aren't ignorant. She's more stubborn than she seems. It also means that when she doesn't follow that by explaining why it is she turns him down, that's knowing too. The silence drags on. At first she's honestly unsure what she can say that he'd understand, and the longer she goes without telling him, the more Natasha wonders if she has to explain it at all.

Oh....oh. The tables have shifted and Cesare is all too aware of it. Cesare knows very little about Natasha, even less than he thought he did, and now it seems she knows a considerable amount about him. At this point, at least in regard to information, she has the advantage. He tries to level the playing field a little and so, when he speaks, it is in Spanish. He spent most of his young life in Italy, yes, but his blood is Spanish. The Borgias are Catalan. Natasha may know a lot about him, yes, but she doesn't yet know everything. He would remind her of that.

"I am everywhere, dear."

The use of dear is deliberate, yet another reminder of her status and age versus his.

"And you still have not yet answered my question."

Why would he know about her? In vampire ranks, she was a nobody. A valuable nobody—well trained and talented, but still a nobody. Natasha, on the other hand, had made it a point to know who was powerful in London, and she'd deepened her inquiries after Cooper managed to surprise her. Cesare was old enough, powerful enough, important enough—it couldn't be all that surprising that he'd have a reputation?

Her jaw tightens at his response. She doesn't have a problem understanding it, but answering it would be more difficult. Her teachers hadn't prioritized Spanish the way they had English or German, hadn't esteemed it as highly as French or Italian. No, her Spanish wasn't going to impress anyone.

But that didn't mean she didn't have another ace up her sleeve, and one she didn't mind burning.

Latin was a dead language anyway.

"No, I haven't. You've seen through me on that," she says evenly. Her Latin is good. Her teachers would have been proud. It's clearly academic, the kind that they taught in school, but it's much better than her Spanish and has the added points of being both more obscure and more specific.

"Isn't it normally considered rude for a man to ignore a woman's hints? Especially when he has her cornered.""

The look that Cesare gives Natasha is one of surprise, appreciation and almost pride. By this point he is too impressed to be combative. He had not expected that from her. He expels the air from his lungs in astonishment, a half-laugh, half-growl, grins and bites his lip.

He hasn't spoken Latin in a long time, but it flows naturally from his lips, the same way that someone would sing an old nursery rhyme that they had learned as a child. There's some joy in it. He speaks with the round vowels and soft consonants of Ecclesiastical Latin.

"Undoubtedly. But I am foul and unprincipled, so I'll ask again: what the fuck is stopping you?" He smirks as he swears, wondering if Natasha was taught that in school, or whether or not she might have learned such language the same way he had: by reading scribbled notes passed around by giggling classmates.

He's not angry or belligerent anymore. By this point he is curious, playful, throwing in some colourful language for good fun.

Her lips twitch a little at his expression, but it's brief. She's put him off his temper at least, and briefly she almost feels like herself. She's talented. She's good at putting people more powerful than herself off balance, avoiding their temper. The feeling is fleeting though; there were too many things about herself that she doesn't like for the reminder not to turn sour quickly.

She does follow his words though, even the foul language. She learned it what must have been the second most common way—whispering with her older classmates, sneaking some of the more risqué reading material from the library when their teachers weren't looking.

"Stubborn, too," she murmurs. Then Natasha sighs. She knows that she can't keep putting him off. Even if she managed to sidestep his anger once, he's not letting her escape giving him a meaningful answer. There's a moment of hesitation as she considers how much to say.

At least if they're overheard, the chances of eavesdroppers speaking Latin is fairly low. She says slowly, feeling out the words as she goes, "Before I was turned, I was KGB; before that, a war orphan. At some point I realized I didn't even recognize who I was when I didn't have blood on my hands, and I didn't much like who I was. This is a way to try to find out. Get a little control of my life."

When Cesare hears the word "stubborn", he grins, broad and predatory. He hasn't been called something so flattering in a while. He basks in it. To be stubborn means to have principles, character, a spine. Cesare would rather be dead than not be stubborn.

He listens carefully to her explanation, being patient with her as she works through her words. When she's done with them, though, he isn't too impressed. Sorry, Natasha. He's not an easy man to convince when it comes to his views on vampirism. He shrugs and takes a swig of his drink.

"Some people are meant to have blood on their hands." He himself has known many people who were better suited living their lives by ending the lives of others.

He could make the point that he doesn't believe depriving yourself to the point that it affects your health is exactly control, but he leaves it for now. He's made his views on the necessity of drinking very clear.

"Maybe," she says, not so much allowing for the possibility as not arguing his opinion on the matter. She's not trying to convince him not to drink human blood, and if he doesn't understand her reasons, she can't force him to. "I have nothing but time to find out for myself though. Maybe I'll try this for six months, five years, either way..."

What was even a few years to them?

She glances away, the smell of blood from the glass wearing on her nerves more than she likes to admit, and she can't hide her tension entirely. The temptation to let him win this argument is very real.

But he's not the only one who's stubborn.

"It sounds boring as hell, if you ask me." Idiotic and boring. But Natasha is her own woman. If she wants to be foolish, that's her own prerogative. He's made his point and she has made hers.

He reaches into his suit pocket and pulls out a card and a pen, crossing out the number on it and replacing it with another, a direct line.

"Just in case you need to contact me." She knows who is. She knows that he can help her if she wants it. A vampire is a vampire and Cesare is happy to help them, even if they act like fools.

"For a drink?" Natasha asks, her brows tugging together slightly. If she did fall off the wagon, she didn't have a problem hunting for herself. That part was only part of the problem. Not an insignificant part, she supposes, but still only part of it.

"Or did you have something else in mind?"

Cesare smiles and rolls his eyes slightly.

"For anything." And he means it. At his age, he's used to a lot of peculiar requests. He's helped a lot of people with a lot of strange things. You never know when you might need a friend.

"But, of course, a drink will always be on offer too."

Natasha stops herself from asking why. If Cesare wants to be generous, that's his business. Considering how their meeting might have gone, there are much worse outcomes than that. She doesn't expect to to take him up on the offer, but there's no reason to reject it outright.

She takes the card and glances over it briefly before tucking it away in her purse.

"I'll keep that in mind."

Nobody ever expects to take Cesare's offer. Over the years he's realised that. In fact, many reject him outright immediately (he suspects pride has something to do with it). But people have a tendency to find themselves in need of money or shelter or a cover up, and their words (and pride) are often forgotten.

He's said his piece for now and so he smiles politely, his gaze firm as he bows his head and gets up to leave.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

There's a place I know I can always go (Open)

A?

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject