Description: It really does seem as if every time they meet, Tran is completely off his rocker with rage or despair, and Frei's attempts to cheer him up or, at the least, make sense of him only piss Tran off more. For once, however, things end up with a twist. Of course, what that twist bodes of is anyone's guess. Now with 100% more NyQuil chugging.
Southtown: a city in recovery. Everything's gone to shit, but now everything is finally getting better. The indomitable spirit of its citizens is rising to the task of making their city better than ever, one step at a time.
Dr. Tran: a man in a swift, brutal downward spiral. While it could be argued that, as a person, there is not much room for him to fall, he is currently doing a fine job of proving that wrong through painful example.
A bottle in one hand (XXX brand alchohol-based product) and a smaller, less conspicuous bottle in the other (off-brand Nyquil), he staggers down the sidewalk, looking like hell. The smell alone is enough to keep most people away, but for those with more gumption, there is also the crazed expression on his face, alternating between grief and 'I'll kick your ass if I catch you looking at me funny.'
Thankfully for the people of Southtown, Tran's vision is a little bit blurry right now.
Lucky people!
Is Frei lucky? It's hard to tell. He's had... a lot to take in, lately. A lot of decisions to make and issues to evaluate. Did he do the right thing, killing off the duplicates of himself that powered the Artemis Engine? Did he do the right thing, trying to protect Kula from Alma? Just who is Adelheid Bernstein, and what is his giant flying airship, the Sky Noah? Will Frei's chi sensitivity ever come back or is he doomed to be forever locked out from his former skills? These are weighty issues. Things that deserve serious, measured consideration. Philosophical effort.
Ice cream.
It helps him think; that's what he's telling himself. And approximately one Baskin-Robbins franchise survived the assault on Southtown, which is why the now white-haired fighter finds himself in a part of town he normally wouldn't frequent. At the store, he worked through flavors 1-12. 13 had to be placed in a waffle cone to go, because the staff were giving him dirty looks. Said waffle cone -- it's full of butter pecan; the flavors aren't alphabetical -- is currently in his hand as he walks down the healing streets of Southtown, absorbed in his own problems. SO absorbed, in fact, that he rounds a corner and stops just short of walking right into... Dr. Tran. Dr. Tran badly in need of an episode of Intervention, it would appear.
Sadly, the most clever thing he can think of to say is: "...Tran."
Then he licks the ice cream cone, because let's face it, 3 scoops in a waffle cone ain't cheap.
Matters of the heart, ponderous with an inexplicably heavy weight. Dr. Tran is familiar with them, sort of. None on Frei's level, of course. Hell, the good doctor has no idea what's really been going on for the duration of the seige, not really. He is, as they say, out of the loop, which is fine with him because frankly he's got enough problems without adding anybody else's.
For example: finding his path suddenly blocked off by an ice cream cone riding a monk, unaware that it is simply being taken advantage of for its delicious flavor. Something about this tall (comparitively) fellow seems familiar, though. Tran reaches for a moment, squinting uncertainly. He takes a drink to help get the memory juices flowing, belches, and then decides that he knows exactly how to handle this.
"That's DOCTOR Tran to you, ass!" Tran pauses, letting that sink in, before continuing. "Who are you, again?"
Alcohol... it seems to follow Tran. It is his albatross, if someone so great as Tran can be said to have something so pedestrian as an albatross. The smell of it assaults Frei, who tries his best not to react badly but frankly, even he is forced back a step as he glances at Tran taking not just the hair of the dog, but likely the entire pelt of the dog, in an attempt to remember just who it is that's standing in front of him. For a moment, Frei's free hand goes up to his hair, the only thing different about him; however, it seems just as likely that Tran wouldn't recognize himself if he were standing in front of a mirror.
There's a moment of indecision as Frei tries to think of exactly what he should do. Tran when drunk... well. Tran is homocidally belligerent when *sober*, let alone with alcohol in the equation. Trying to actually, say, take the bottle from him isn't going to go well at all. On the other hand, he doesn't want to just stand there and do *nothing*; even by Tran's standards, he's in a miserable state at the moment. Closing his eyes for a moment, Frei takes in a deep breath, then turns and throws the ice cream cone onto the sidewalk somewhere. What's one dessert against another man's well being?
Turning back, Frei laces his fingers together with his arms behind his back, tilting his head at the good doctor. "Frei, Tr... Doctor Tran," he says simply. "Are you alright?" That's a stupid question, but you never know.
"Frei?" Dr. Tran's initial return is one of puzzlement, trying to figure out how this can be. He sort of looks like Frei, sure, but there's the hair...and the ice cream. Would Frei ever throw ice cream away? Something seems fishy.
"Am I alright, huh. A fine question, ASSASSIN." Dr. Tran raises his bottle accusingly. "Thought you could get past my defenses by impersonating your brother, huh? Well too bad, I wasn't born yesterday! You'll have to get up last night if you want to fool me!"
Tran takes a step back, the bottle weaving around dangerously in what is /clearly/ meant to be the perfect weapon-based defense. "So who sent you!? Was it Elle? I'm going to make you squeal for daring to attack me, you weiner!"
"My brother," Frei says, with infinite patience, "has black hair." While this is not strictly 100% true -- Threnody, one of the twins, has red hair like Frei once did -- Tran himself could only have met Kataki, so this is a statement the YFCC instructor feels confident in. Of course, further reflection makes it apparent that Tran... probably doesn't mean any actual sibling but, in fact, was speaking a sort of gibberish that only makes sense to his alcohol-addled brain. This realization, in spite of his wanting to wince awfully at the state Tran is in, makes him turn his head to the side and sigh with exasperation. He's not trained for this. Where's an AA meeting when you need one?
Frei's green-eyed gaze tracks the movements of the bottle for a moment, as if he's expecting it to be slammed against the concrete, but something in the way Tran delivers that last line makes him blink in confusion, letting that fear slide for the moment in favor of interrogating Tran about his current state. Anger churns up adrenaline, after all, and there's a CHANCE that will at least start metaoblizing the alcohol a little faster. "Nobody sent me! And I don't know anyone named Elle. Tran, seriously..." And here, he tries very hard NOT to reach out and grab Tran and simply shake him like a maraca, which is a common urge when Tran and alcohol come together. "Gimmie the bottle, alright? I dunno what's going on but you're going to get yourself hurt."
"And how do I know you don't have more brothers? Your people are renowned for their fertility...and their /professional killers/." Tran does not elucidate on what he means by 'your people', especially since he's not entirely sure what nationality Frei actually is, besides perhaps 'chill dude'.
"Besides, that's just what an assassin would say. I'll give you one chance, ONE!" Tran punctuates this by pointing straight up with the bottle while simultaneously putting a finger up at the same time, inadvertantly creating two. "To convince me that you're telling the truth. Something that only Frei would know, or can do, or can do know!"
And here is where it all goes downhill for poor, honest, stupid Frei, whose general reaction to surprising events and unexpected questions or interrogation is to, as a defense mechanism, tell the absolute and unwavering truth. Surprisingly, this typically has the effect of so shocking the person to whom he's speaking that the tense situation defuses itself before it even starts. In Tran's case this may result in anything from a simple 'oh', to a street brawl, to a musical number of some kind. Regardless, Frei simply forges on ahead with a sudden look of confused introspection. "Well, you don't," he responds, again falling back on the truth when all else fails. "I mean, Kataki is a twin. And I come from a line of government assassins, believe it or not, though we haven't done that sort of thing for 200 years plus."
Not helping your case, Frei.
He doesn't intend it to, but Tran's demand hits Frei like a proverbial hammer. Something only Frei could know or do... well, the list of appropriate things used to be a lot longer. Sadly, as he is now, Frei can't really think of anything specific only he can *do*... so he opts for something only Frei would know, or at least in a way that only Frei would know it. "Uh... I was fighting Alma in Russia once and he asked if I hated him because I seemed angry, so I kissed him on international television to prove I was over him." He delivers this line with his head tilted slightly to the side, a finger poked against his cheek in embarrassed confusion.
"AHA! I KNEW IT! SO YOU ARE wait." Tran's triumphant cry is cut short mid-triumph as Frei goes on and supplies him with more detail than he really ever wanted to know. The expression on the doctor's face slowly goes blank, becoming devoid of all emotion.
"That is, without a doubt..." Tran closes his eyes, walks to a nearby wall, and slumps against it. "...the third gayest thing I have ever heard. I'm going to pretend that never happened and you're never going to bring it up again and there better not have been tongue."
Tran opens his eyes. "Hi, Frei. Next time be a pal and just mention that time I asked you for help, or maybe kill me."
There's a long pause. Eventually, Frei says the only thing that comes to mind: "...'third'?"
Well... it might have been oversharing for Tran, but on the other hand, there's no therapy like shock therapy. If it took Frei going just a WEE bit too far to snap the good doctor back to reality, well... he can handle Tran's funk ending with him being mad at Frei. In the end, him not destroying any more brain cells with alcohol so cheap Zima looks down on it is the most important thing. Deciding that it's probably safe to get within closer than 10 feet of him, now, Frei walks over to the same wall at a respectable, not-after-your-most-secret-places distance and has a seat himself, though he makes sure he's not sitting on or against anything 1.) disgusting or 2.) sharp.
For a second, he doesn't say anything more; he simply draws his knees up, rests his hands on top, and looks into the sky. Eventually, however, he lolls his head to the left and fixes Doctor Tran with an inquisitve expression. "Do I want to know what drove you to attempt suicide in the slowest, most alcohol-soaked way possible?" He glances at the discarded bottle, then back at Tran. "I mean, there's drinking to forget, but this is excessive even by your standards."
"Third. Don't ask again because I'm not going to tell you." As Tran rests, looking every bit as pathetic as he was when he was staggering around, he seems pretty content to not say anything further. If the conversation was just over, he would be pretty ok with it on the whole. But it's not, because Frei is entirely too nice to just let a problem lie. Damn.
With a labored sigh, Tran slumps down. "M'not drinking to forget, it's a disguise." He does not point out the obvious flaws with this idea, letting it instead sit for a moment. Eventually he goes on as if he'd never even said that. "I'm not killing myself with it, I'm doing it until I do something stupid that kills me before something stupid I already did can kill me. There's a difference." Again, silence, as Tran tries to figure out what he just said, without a great deal of success. Eventually, he falls upon his last resort.
"Shut up is why, god, what are you, my mother?"
Leaning back against the wall and turning his head skyward again, Frei crosses his arms over his chest. When he speaks, it's in a tone of airy dismissiveness, as if he's just dropping words into space and whatever gets said, gets said. "If I were your mother..." Frei says, sniffling a little, "I wouldn't beat around the bush asking you what the heck you think you're doing. I'd probably just beat it out of you until you decided to stop being stupid." His head comes back down, but his eyes don't open, at least not all the way; they stay heavy-lidded for a moment. Mother... yeah. Perhaps Frei's projecting his own mother's way of doing things onto his vision of Tran's maternal unit, but there's not a lot to go on. Frei always assumed that Tran was like in that one episode of Futurama or the Simpsons where an entire civilization springs full-formed from the DNA left on a beer bottle or something. The idea of someone like Tran having parents actually throws Frei for a minor loop.
And because he fixates, when his eyes DO open -- and thankfully, before he turns back to Tran -- Frei mouths the word 'third?', one more time.
Eventually, however, he resumes being a complete busybody in Tran's personal life, which is to say that he disavows any right he has to be doing so in the first place. "You're right..." Frei says absently, glancing to the side a moment. "It's your life and it's not really my place to tell you how to live it, but..." He pauses, then turns back toward the street before tilting his head Tran-ward again. His tone is conspiratorial, curious... as if he's sharing a big secret with Tran, just to see how he'll react.
Probably because that's exactly what he's doing.
"What if I told you," Frei says, carefully, "that in the last few days I killed what I think were 27 clones of myself?" Really, there should be a careful silence that follows, a chance for Drunk!Tran to digest that piece of information and come to emotional equilibrium with it. Frei, knowing better, doesn't even give him THAT much; it's barely a moment before he follows with, "So I've seen enough people die lately. Don't tack yourself on because I don't think I could take it right now."
"If you were my mother you would claim I'm breaking her heart and wonder why I couldn't be more like my sisters and--" Tran cuts off abruptly, even in his inebriated state aware that maybe he's letting a little more slip than he wants to.
It's a good thing he doesn't see Frei silently mouthing off, too, because for a moment, Dr. Tran is extremely on edge.
Thankfully, Frei moves on, although the doctor is still tense. So when Frei finishes casually dropping his mass-murder/suicide spree (what does it even count as?), Dr. Tran doles out the harshness. "So what?" It comes out harsher than he meant, but either he doesn't notice or decides to ignore it and press on with a shocking lack of empathy.
"A bunch of clones? Are they even people? Are you not even sure if they were yours? Whatever." Tran raises his arms to gesticulate pointlessly. Then he changes the topic back to himself.
"Don't kid yourself, either, if I died you guys wouldn't even notice for months, maybe years. I could vanish tomorrow, AGAIN, and you wouldn't even know, so don't even try to pretend otherwise."
He opens his mouth to reply that what Tran has said isn't true, but in point of fact, he knows that it is. Consumed in his own problems, the young sage hasn't had time to think about anyone else in quite some time. A part of him, the logical part, speaks up, reminds him that the things that happened to him were not minor, that there's a perfectly good excuse for why Frei lost track of Mizuki, of Tran, of Kentou, of Sakura... of quite a lot of people. He had a lot on his mind, a lot on his plate. He was mind controlled, chi drained, and all sorts of other things.
But if, in the face of all of that, he gives up his empathy for others and simply focuses on himself? Would he still be the same person?
No.
The news hurts, and it's hard for Frei to keep the physical signs of that hidden; his torso slumps forward, resting against his knees as he wraps his arms around them. His voice is faintly muffled as he ducks his head down onto his arms; it's really as if he'd like to just curl into a little ball right there. Still, though, he speaks, acknowledging Tran's continued presence. "That's probably true," he admits, quietly. "I don't... I don't know what happened to you. And I have a good reason, but a good reason doesn't undo what's been done." His head turns to the side, and Tran is treated to Frei's green-eyed gaze looking out from over the line of his arm, watching Tran. "I'm sorry that whatever it is happened to you, you were alone to deal with it."
Everybody's got their own problems; interestingly enough, it seems that Frei is coping with the problem that he's not paying enough attention to other people's problems. Dr. Tran finds it difficult, if not impossible, to empathize (shock of shocks), especially since he has no idea what's going on in Frei's head at any given time. Especially not in light of recent events. This train of thought is no exception.
"Oh, don't get like that, christ." Tran rolls his eyes and looks away, disgust and exasperation rolled into one, splayed across his features. "The power of friendship and teamwork might have its place but it wouldn't have helped at all this time so you may as well stop moping. Deal with it like an adult and start drinking or something, jeez."
Well now we've come full circle, haven't we? Tran is sad, and drinking. Frei is introspective, and eating. They run into each other by accident, Frei is concerned, he gets Tran to stop drinking by provoking him (on accident), and in the course of explaining why he was troubled Tran has made Frei significantly more morose to the point where the idea of drinking himself into oblivion actually has a significant sort of appeal. All of that information seems to process in Frei's head, sequentially, he despite not feeling a WHOLE lot better he sits back up, leans against the wall, and says in a tone of... if not outright frustration, then at least a mild degree of 'what-do-you-with-a-problem-like-Tran-ri-aaaaaaaaa'ness. "You... have to be the most exasperating individual on the planet," Frei says, matter of factly. It's true. There are certainly those more outright annoying, absolutely those with greater amounts of raw evil running in their veins, but Tran is just out and out *exasperating*. The kind of person you don't want to beat up but wouldn't mind shoving down a well.
"Anyhow," Frei says with a shrug, "I dunno that I believe much in the power of friendship and teamwork, right now." Alma... Jiro. The latter's sacrifice allowed three others to escape unharmed, but now his fate is uncertain. The former... the former took his supposedly 'sacred' power to a place Frei would never have gone, and now he finds himself doubting his trust in that individual. He'd said 'trust me', but increasingly, Frei finds Alma's powers -- and the way he wields them -- strange and troublesome.
And then there's Tran: solid, dependably angry Tran.
"What, does Alma have you sleeping on the doghouse with Snoopy or something?" Unfair, untrue, insulting and incoherent, all wrapped up into one. Dr. Tran is truly in fine form tonight.
The doctor waves a hand dismissively, as if not believing Frei capable of anything other than sunshine and kittens and balloons, despite previous evidence to the contrary. And then he pauses, as if just now hearing Frei's accusation.
"What? Screw you and your family's bicycle, I'm the very goddamn picture of civility and reason and it's you and those other shmucks who get all mopey and crap all the time."
For a second, all Frei does is open his mouth, then close it, and shut his eyes... rinse and repeat a few times. It's that peculiar quality Tran has to really just sort of shut down any standard response individuals have to things that get said. For a moment Frei thinks it over, mentally cataloguing the responses of every individual the two have in common acquaintance: Hotaru, Alma, Kentou, Jiro, Mizuki... and those four are just a start. And in consideration, EVERYBODY gets a little crazy. The normally genteel Hotaru's expression tightens; the perky Kentou becomes wary, and Alma... well that's best not to think about. Jiro seems to be only one unaffected and that is, likely, because Jiro's ground state is FURY! OVERWHELMING! at pretty much any living being, so there's nowhere to go but up.
What a valuable commodity that is, in its own way.
Deciding that trying his normal type of empathy on Tran isn't going to work, and that trying to pry emotional admissions out of Tran has a -20 penalty to the Diplomacy roll, he instead crosses his arms behind his head and leans back against the wall. "Well, if you're going to die, I'll be sure to order you a proper headstone." Opening his eyes, Frei takes his arms from behind his head and spreads them out, as if describing a huge billboard or sign. "Here lies Doctor Tran: He was too short for the Facekicker."
With a surly countenance, Tran proceeds to make a show of ignoring whatever Frei's going to try next, instead unscrewing the child-proof cap of the NyQuil with a practiced hand. He raises it to his lips and starts to drink just in time to hear Frei describe his headstone.
Moments later, a sickly green sticky cone is splattered across the pavement. Tran, meanwhile, is very apparantly choking to death. With no small amount of tears, hacking, and chest-thumping, he manages to cough out a short response to Frei. "Mur...der..." Lifting a hand as if to choke the life out of the provacative monk, Tran quickly collapses into another coughing fit.
It takes a short time for the doctor to settle down, and by that time his more homicidal impulses have quieted. "I thought you were trying to keep me from dying, jackass."
And so, things settle back into their relative normality. That reaction gets a faint grin out of Frei who, after a moment where his uncontrollable urge to help people considers how best to get Tran to stop choking, realizes he's going to be fine and leans back against the wall. "If you can still get mad at me and talk like that, then things can't be all that bad," he says patiently, taking a deep breath. Yep... as long as you're alive, things can't be as bad as possible. It's death you have to watch out for... and in his own weird way, Tran is just too angry to die. Nowhere to go but up.
But some impulses can't be curbed, and Frei has an annoyingly good memory. 'I'm doing it until I do something stupid that kills me before something stupid I already did can kill me.' It's some work, thinking of something so awful that 1.) it can result in death and 2.) is so foolish even Tran will admit it was stupid to do it. Did he kill the Prime Minister of Japan? Take over as chairman at AIG? Audition for American Idol? Although he doesn't say anything immediately, Frei DOES suddenly look agitated, and give an exasperated sigh. It's doubtful Tran will admit it even under torture, which sadly isn't all that helpful. "Without getting 'mopey'," Frei says, bringing his hands up and making appropriate finger quotes, "I still care about what happens to you, you know."
Dr. Tran tries to process the logic behind Frei's initial statement. Things can't be all that bad? Of course they can! Tran shakes his head, annoyed, since for some bizarre reason Frei is enjoying his anguish and anger. "Sadist." It's clearly the only explanation.
Of course, Dr. Tran doesn't remember saying half of the things he's said, maybe more. Perhaps he is even incapable of remembering what he's vowed to never tell another soul, especially not meddlesome ones like Frei. "If you care so much about what happens to me, then...then..." Tran freezes up a little, unable to actually come up with even a flimsy excuse to describe how little Frei cares. /Shit/. "Shut up is why! Uh, why don't you ask about my day! I mean, uh, shit!" Panic is never pretty.
At this point, Frei's inertia is too great to be stopped, especially by statements that don't even make sense in the context of conversational flow. Dusting off his jeans, he rises to his feet and stretches his arms over his head, making an 'nnnnnnh!' sound as he does so that really does put one in mind of a cat waking after a nap. When he brings his arms down, one goes behind his back and the other runs through the white hair on top of his head. It's his badge, his sign that something is different and isn't going to be the same again. But there are still things out there worth being around for. 31 flavors of ice cream, for example, or watching Tran nearly choke to death on NyQuil for being reminded that he is so very short.
"Why do I need to ask? You were not only trying to drink yourself into suicidal stupidity, but you were doing it with bargain-basement..." He pauses, looking at the bottle of whatever Tran was drinking, and seeing the 'XXX' label for the first time. He frowns, tapping it with his shoe, and thankfully does not notice the brief flicker of smoke as it eats away at the rubber sole. "...stuff, and over the counter cold medicine. Frankly, I don't think I need 'Dr. Tran: Behind the Music' to figure out you've had a miserable day."
In as petulant a voice as he can manage, while at the same time cramming in as much indignance as he can manage, Tran responds, "It's not stuff. It's XXX brand fermented grain beverage." Not just 'stuff' at all. "And it's /great/." If you're judging based on a 'cost-to-drunkness' ratio, at least.
"And I have...a cold." This is an obvious lie. Tran is not so drunk that he is incapable of recognizing this fact. "It's, uh, it's clearing up really nicely? Shit."
Pushing himself to his feet, Tran's arms begin to move independantly in an angry, disjointed fashion. "So so what? What's your point? What do you want me to say?"
That actually gives Frei pause for a moment. What DOES he want Tran to say? 'What's bugging you?' would be a good start though, he considers, if TRULY asked to expound on the potential answers to that question Tran could keep him here all night or, in an extreme case, probably all WEEK. But other enigmas present themselves, marching across Frei's consciousness like a news ticker. Why are you hiding something? Why don't you actually just come out and say what you feel? Why do you have this ridiculous self-destructive kick? And, let's not forget: 'third?'.
It's probably for the best that Frei asks none of these questions, though he really really wants to.
Eventually, he just shrugs. "I dunno... I don't think you HAVE to say anything," Frei says at last. And somewhere, internally, he checks a little box. So many times this can go on before he really does crack, his resolve breaks, and he ties Tran to a chair Clockwork Orange style for interrogation. As it is now, though, he tries to take some cheer in the things he knows to be true: Tran is alive, ornery as ever, but at least unlikely to off himself in the near future. No guarantees, but. "But if you're feeling really generous, you could promise me you'll consider asking someone for help as an ALTERNATIVE to suicide."
"You're damn right I don't HAVE to say anything!" However, odds aren't bad that the longer a given conversation goes on, Dr. Tran will, in fact, say anything. It's a statistical inevitability, like monkeys with typewriters. Which is to say, if you have an infinite numbers of monkeys, eventually some of them will steal some typewriters and then poop on them.
That aside, Tran makes a kind of grinding noise from deep in his throat. It sounds positively unhealthy. This goes on for several seconds, until Tran finally mumbles under his breath but still more than loud enough for Frei to hear, "Just like a goddamn woman." Then he clears his throat and says in a normal voice (which is basically shouting) "Absolutely not. But I'll tell you what. I am feeling generous, so if I decide to kill myself I'll get someone else to help."
Frei might not want to trust the look Tran gets on his face after he says this. The looks says very plainly 'Even though I'm bordering on flat-out insensibility I have a brilliant idea.' Uh-oh.
With a sigh and a shake of the head, Frei folds his hands in front of his face, gripping his nose for a moment. Something about Tran just makes his sinuses hurt. There's the fact, for example, that the last sentence could be read as 'I will get someone to help me solve my problems' OR 'I will get someone to kill me instead'. Bringing his hands down, Frei gives Tran a look that is calculated to express his disinterest in Tran's fate, which probably isn't all that believable at this point, but it's not as if Frei considers that overmuch. "I dunno what's more selfish, me wanting you not to throw away your life like an idiot, or you for wanting to do it so much, apparently." The real answer is probably both, but as far as Frei is concerned, the former is a selfishness he can live with, and the latter is just plain stupid. He doesn't belabor the point at least, however.
There's a pause, and then finally Frei shakes his head. "I'd... better go." He inclines his head at the remains of the central train station, way in the distance. It's probably not in any operable shape, but it's also one of the locations Adel indicated as somewhere Frei could meet the men with connections to get him back on the Sky Noah. He can ask Bernstein for this one favor... it's pretty reasonable, from his POV.
"I have to find a different way to fight, without being able to use chi anymore," he explains with a shrug. For the second time, speaking with Tran has helped Frei make up his mind about something. He has a heritage... he may have closed that door once, but if last year's events taught him anything, it's that no door closes forever. "I'm not even sure I can anymore, but I have to try, you know?"
This is Dr. Tran's scheming face. He has a scheme. It is a good scheme, a sinister plot that only a brilliant mind like his could conceive of. None other could dare hope to understand the magnificence of this scheme, to even stand in its way would be a herculean effort. IT IS THE ULTIwait no chi what.
Dr. Tran stares at Frei for a moment, uncomprehending. Did that get mentioned before? No, no, he's pretty sure it was mostly just the clone killing. "Wait wait wait, hang on, rewind, back up, back up."
Pointing a finger-gun upward, Tran releases a tiny steam of chi, a pin-prick of rising steam. "You. None of this." He pauses, then blows the misty trail off his fingertips. "HOW. Why, when you're going on about this clone-killing crap, would you skip the important parts. Tell me."
Probably the stupidest thing Frei could do in response is shrug; because he's not really paying attention to the actual emotional affect buried in the enigma that is Tran, at this point, it's what he does anyway. To him, killing a bunch of clones was considerably more traumatic, all things considered. Still, it's not as if he can't explain it to Tran... especially since, at least NOW, he halfway understands what it is that happened.
"Shadaloo..." the white-haired man starts. It's the name that Shurui used, the name that Hotaru confirmed. He doesn't really know anything about it, other than the vague hints that they are Super Secret Organization with Super Secret Evil Goals that are Super Secret and Evil. As for members? No clue. He does recall Marz, but only in an abstract way; at the time that he 'knew' the Doll, Frei wasn't exactly in his right mind. "They, ah... kidnapped me. Well, not just me. Hotaru too, and Ichiro Oe... you probably don't know him, he's a student at Taiyo." A pause, and Frei realizes that he's not only talking faster, and diverging, but that it's entirely due to nerves. He'd THOUGHT he'd dealt with this, internally; at least that's what he'd hoped. But in fact, Tran is the first person he's had to outright explain things to.
Green eyes dull a bit with the emotion of it, and Frei's gaze spends more time on the ground than on Tran's face. "I don't know exactly what they did. I think it was some experimental drug. Whatever else it was supposed to do, it just made me go... out of control." Which is the understatement of the year. Amping up his ability to manipulate chi wasn't even the worst part; it's that the line between Frei the individual, and the... 'force' (for lack of better terms) of chi started to blur. "Mizuki... I attacked her for no good reason. Then some girl set me on Kentou and Alma. They snapped me out of it, but in the end..." He looks up, finally, and shrugs again, though with more effort poured into it this time. "I burned myself out, or something. I don't really know what happened. But I can't... it's like being deaf and blind and mute all at the same time. I know it's... there, but I can't touch it, can't feel it. So... nada."
"What, Shadaloo, really? You AND Hotaru?" Ichiro, being someone Tran doesn't know, gets a total pass. "Jeez, girl can't catch a break, can she? Well, go figure." Maybe Dr. Tran is a little too familiar, too casual with the name of the criminal organization, but his attention is too elsewhere for him to care. It's not even on Frei; at least, not on how he's reacting to talking about all this. It's a lot to get off someone's chest all at once, but the doctor doesn't seem to notice and/or care.
"Reeeeally." Tran notes, filling the silence while he thinks on what Frei's just told him. He should not have the beginning of a smile on his face. If the 'I have a brilliant idea' face before was bad, this one is a thousand times worse. Beware, Frei.
"Tell you what, I'll tell you what. Let's you and I make a little deal, Frei." Tran gestures in the direction Frei gestured, trying to act as casual as possible. Because he's Tran, it doesn't work very well. "You have to go, that's fine, we're all busy." Except Tran. "I'll try not to kill myself too hard, and in a couple of weeks, let's 'talk' again." The little apostrophes are audible. "I am a doctor, you know. There might be something I can do to help. I mean, sure, I don't really have any equipment, and sure, I'm not sober most days of the week..." Dr. Tran, sensing that perhaps he has begun to ramble, attempts to wrap things up quickly, the mischeivious gleam in his eye impossible to conceal. "But I've got some advantages, too, so let me have a look at you some time, see if I can do anything to help."
Finally, Tran's smile turns into a full-fledged grin. "It's the least I owe you for your help."
He probably should notice the cheshire grin. The truth is, though, Tran saved himself from suspicion by offering uncharacteristic generosity/sympathy to someone who, as Kula found out, believes in people even unto death, usually with predictably awful results. Problematically, this means Frei takes Tran entirely at face value, leaving him a few weeks of blissful ignorance and Tran a few weeks of mounting cinematic irony and schadenfreude. But Frei's response is as typically guileless as ever; at first he blinks, eyes round and wide with confusion, before he breaks into an embarrassed smile. No, this man isn't a real doctor. But, as Frei himself tried to convince Tran once upon a time, he DOES have special skills that he shouldn't ignore.
Oh, you white-haired fool. You will rue this day.
"I, uh..." Frei quickly bites back the response that was about to escape his lips, which is to say: 'Thank you for developing some empathy'. That is no way to encourage him. Instead he just rubs the back of his head a bit and says, evenly: "I don't think you owe me anything... but thanks, Tran." If Frei does have any doubts on this, it's in the idea that his 'problem' can be fixed externally. In his eyes, if it comes back, it comes back... and while he's comfortable searching for solutions on his own, he's less comfortable with the idea of a 'quick fix'. All things in their due season, after all.
"I'd, uh, better go." 'I have an airship to catch!' No! That is bad. Do not say that. "I'm sure the trains are crazy, and it's a long trip..."
Even if Frei were to just say whatever was on the top of his mind, Dr. Tran might not notice. This is the most /interesting/ thing he's heard of in weeks that hasn't been like getting kicked right in the balls. Empathy? Huh, sure. Airship? Have fun, pinch a stewardess' ass for me. Or maybe a steward's, whatever you enjoy most.
Instead, Tran cheerfully raises his cough syrup in a sort of toast to Frei. "Try not to get yourself killed!" He takes a swig, sighs in satisfaction, and goes about on his own way, his day significantly cheered by Frei despite the rough edges their conversation held.
Log created on 21:11:18 06/24/2009 by Frei, and last modified on 03:01:04 06/25/2009.