Who: Bran and Chuuya What: running into each other over drinks Where: the casino When: backdated to Sun. night Warnings: probably swearing Status: g-doc
Bran Duval did not handle boredom well. He never had as his older brother could attest. Tonight he had his camera in his camera bag, which he kept closed while in the casino. He’d taken some photos earlier in the evening, outside, and uploaded them so he could check them on his phone while he had a drink. Not the best way to see whether or not he liked how they turned out, but at least it was a start.
After he’d won a few rounds of Poker of course. Bran subsisted on both poker and compulsion, as long as he didn’t stupidly try to compel a vampire not from his world. He used his brother’s interactions with Kol as a learning moment.
Bourbon in hand Damien’s younger brother, who looked a lot like his elder brother, save eye colour and a few subtle differences, sat and glared at the one photo he took. “What the fuck is this garbage?” Shit. He’d hit the wrong setting on his new camera hadn’t he?
Chuuya could handle boredom - but only for so long. Growing up in the mafia, he was used to all kinds of chaos and violence and death. He was always busy, either dealing with enemy organizations or smacking dragons with fifty storey buildings. It was rare that he had a break, but it wasn't long before he wanted to get back to work. Kouyou always scolded him for not taking at least a few days vacation but Chuuya was stubborn.
Even now, he still kept busy with the jewelry store. Tonight, though, he'd done all the things he had to do and had some free time. He decided to grab a drink at the casino, maybe play some poker or blackjack and see if Pepper had any new wines at the winery before he headed home.
He went to the bar first, which was probably no surprise to those who knew him and his love for anything alcohol. While ordering, he couldn't help but overhear the guy beside him and he glanced over. "I don't know much about photography but that is a really shit photo," he commented. "Did you take it or did someone send it to you?"
Bran couldn’t help the groan. Rarely he showed emotion, but he took his photographs seriously and he’d just wasted two hours. Maybe he only ruined later photos? The first few looked decent. “Somehow I don’t think I can drink enough bourbon to make this look decent.” His mask of neutrality fell back into place. “Fucking sadly I took it. New camera and pretty sure I did something with the settings with the last few photos.” Bran looked at the earlier photos and, while he didn’t show it, he sure as fuck felt relief that the earlier ones looked good.
“Now I have to fucking figure out what I did wrong.” Bran finally glanced at the guy who spoke. “Chuuya, right? You’re friends with my brother?”
"Probably the only thing that can make it better is to delete it." Unless the guy was the type to keep all the photos he took, including the terrible ones. But if it was Chuuya, he'd just delete it then figure out what went wrong before taking more photos.
"Yep. And you're Bran, yes?" He had figured the moment he saw the guy that he was Damien's brother since they looked similar but with a few differences, of course. He also recalled Damien mentioning his name a couple times or maybe it was Miriam. Either way. "You could say that. Drinking buddies at the very least." Since most of his and Damien's meetings were usually at the bar, having drinks with Miriam.
Bran nodded and deleted the terrible photos. He honestly felt such annoyance because the pictures held promise until he fucked up whatever setting he did. Probably the casino didn’t want him to start examining his camera, but Bran didn’t give a fuck. After turning it on, the vampire started to look through the settings.
“Yeah, I’m Bran.” Friends. Drinking buddies. What the fuck ever. “What brings you out tonight?” His hands and eyes not leaving the camera as he examined it. A moment later a fuck as he found the problem. God, he hated learning new cameras.
Chuuya always felt weird calling someone a friend, even if the other person considered him one. He wasn't sure why. He never really thought about it for long, which wasn't surprising. He was never one to dwell on those sort of things. He just knew that he'd always been like that.
"Boredom, mostly. I can only handle it for so long." He didn't mind the occasional break but he always had to keep busy. If he was idle for too long, he'd start thinking about things he didn't want to think about. "Sounds like you figured out what was wrong," he commented when heard the other vampire.
Bran didn’t press the issue. However, the other vampire described his relationship with Damien didn’t matter to Bran. Especially not at the moment. At least Chuuya bored Bran less than his run-in with Miriam. God, how could one vampire or person speak that much on science? Really?
“Yeah, I don’t do well with boredom either.” Bran hated to be bored, something he found he had to handle more in this world which he despised. “At least this way I can do some people watching while I enjoy a game.” And decide if he wanted to play at any table tonight.
“Yeah, I think so?” Bran took a photo of his shoe, less because he cared about rules about cameras in casinos and more because he didn’t want to deal with people. “Well, if not, I’ll deal with it after this drink.”
If he knew how Bran felt about Miriam, Chuuya would've been amused and perhaps would agree with him a little. He liked Miriam and enjoyed her company. He also liked science and physics, but nowhere near as much as she did apparently. Sometimes she spoke about it too much and he ended up zoning out after a while.
"Unfortunately, the way I normally deal with boredom is frowned upon here." Not that he cared, but he did prefer to not cause trouble unless he had to. "That's good. Now I'm kind of curious what your photos look like without the fucked up settings."
“Oh? How do you deal with boredom? I generally do it with murder and mayhem, but Damien prefers I behave.” Yes, Bran sounded completely annoyed by it, but he understood.
Bran found a few of his earlier black and white photos he liked and showed them to Chuuya. “I promise I do know what I’m doing.”
"Just a bit of violence and torture," Chuuya shrugged. While he didn't have any problems with killing people, he didn't kill simply out of boredom. He probably wouldn't be one of the mafia's executives if he was to kill first, ask questions later. Mori always preferred to do things logically.
He glanced at the photos. "They're pretty good." As far as he was concerned, anyway. A couple photos he could maybe see in an art gallery. But again, he was far from an expert when it came to photography.
Bran eyed the other vampire, brief amusement found in his eyes, before his face fell back to its neutrality. “So less killing, but otherwise I can get behind your ways of dealing with boredom.” For Bran, killing satisfied his more violent impulses, although a little torture didn’t sound like the worst idea to him. Not really.
“Thanks.” Bran finished his drink. “I’m gonna head out. I’ll see you around.”
Chuuya shrugged. "Killing's always been more of a job to me. Besides, most people here aren't challenging enough to kill or even fight." It would be too easy and therefore wouldn't entertain him for long.