Long Road Home (the_wolverine) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2014-10-03 12:00:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | !complete, clarice ferguson (blink), logan howlett (wolverine), neena thurman (domino) |
You’re worse than I am an’ that’s saying a bunch
Who: Logan. Neena and Clarice
What: Drinking, returning guns, relationship advice(lol), bar fight shootouts
When: End of Septemberish
Where: A bar
Status: complete
Rating: PG-13 for gun related violence.
“I’m payin’,” Logan said, gruffly. He smirked at her as he sat down. It had taken a couple of days, but he’d located her gun. But he wanted the steaks first. And honestly, he wanted to see her. They hadn’t had much of a chance to connect, lately, and Logan felt very much like a man who needed to connect to people before he died. Laura and Neena, Astrid and Kitty, Jubilee…
"Like hell you are. I invited YOU to steak and beer." Neena had plenty of money on her hands now that she wasn't paying rent and the pawn shop's contents had been liquidated. The new gun shop hadn't even put a dent in the savings she'd put away over the years, and she was definitely comfortable enough to buy her friend a steak.
She'd taken the most defendable seat in the place, and glanced over his shoulder as she picked up her menu. One could never be too careful these days.
“How about we go dutch, darlin’?” He wasn’t going to argue much further though, and let Neena have this. “How’s the gun shop?”
"It's up and ready to go almost. We polished down the cases the other day and I've been trying to deal with taking inventory and all of that. My staff won't stop giving me shit over some stuff that happened in there. But that's alright, it's all in good fun. Mostly."
Neena smirked a bit as she looked the menu over and added, "Fine, we'll go dutch. But only because I like you so much."
Logan shrugged his shoulder, took one look at the menu and set it down. “House beer an’ a ribeye that’s still mooing. Extra butter for the potatoes.” Simple man, simple tastes. He grinned toothily at her. “What shit happened in there? Someone catch you naked?”
"Oh ha ha." Neena snerked at him and set her own menu down, then waved the waiter over. Her own tastes were about as simple. "No, no one's caught me naked in there yet. But I had a kid running back and forth between the shop and the house during that communications mess and it ended with Clarice challenging me into some kind of mutual proposal."
It was the first time she'd mentioned it to someone else - they'd been keeping it on the down-low, though she knew that was more for her benefit than Clarice's. Logan deserved to know, though. They were close enough friends that she figured he ought to know. And it only made her feel slightly terrified, which she figured was an improvement.
Both of Logan’s eyebrows disappeared into his greying hair. Hair which had gotten more salt and peppery over the past few months.”Mutual proposal. You’re… gettin’ married?”
He didn’t know how to feel about that. He was happy for her, but he was also a little jealous. Of Clarice. Of them being happy. Vel hadn’t even left the fucking ring. There could be some.. hope there, but he’d be fooling himself.
“That’s...wow. Dibs on the bachelor party.”
"I felt like you had the right to know. I mean... I don't really know what the hell we're doing or if it'll even last. We're superheroes. We do stupid shit all the time and it never really gets far, and... hey, you'd know more about that than I would. But you know about my own track record, too, so..." Neena took a deep breath and let it out. Talking about this was getting a little more terrifying.
And he did look like his hair was getting a little greyer, which she thought made him look amazingly handsome. If she wasn't marrying Clarice, she might have been gunning to go home with him that night.
It didn't register that she should be concerned.
"But... yeah, no. Can we NOT make a big deal out of it?"
"Go for it. Don't even let anythin' stop you. Go for it, marry that girl, be happy." He picked up his recently arrived beer and took a sip, then patted her hand. At least one of them could be happy, right? At least Neena could be happy, and Kitty. Fuck if Jubilee and Laura got their heads out of their asses maybe they could be happy too, but he couldn't get Laura to listen to him and half the time he didn't know how to approach her. Or tell her he wanted to adopt her.
"Yeah. Yeah. I'm trying." Neena took another deep breath and let that one out, then knocked back the first glass of whisky they'd delivered. She'd ordered two just for this very thing, but now she wished she'd ordered three. Her liver was going to wave the white flag at her any month now at this rate.
Whatever. Her liver could deal.
"It's just... shit. I don't know, Logan. The only reason we're even doing this is so she can prove to me she can put up with my shit that long. Seems like a really stupid reason. And it's not like tying the knot actually proves anything. Fuck, look at me and Milo. And she's having a real hard time with this whole... me and everyone else thing."
“You an’ everyone else thing,” Logan repeated. “What you an’ everyone else thing?” Now he wished that he’d ordered whiskey instead. He shook his head. “Tyin’ the knot proves a lot. It proves you’re willin’ to try for the long haul.”
Neena gave him a pointed look. "You know, the thing where strings stay attached to everyone I've ever tied them to, and even when we aren't a thing forever I still end up running off to help them at any opportunity. Like I still can't seem to quit Booker, or you, and god help us all if Nate were here. THAT me and everyone else thing."
Logan grunted, and took another sip of his beer. Truth was, there were only a few people he could see strings with from the dream world right now. Two of them were dead, one of them was attached, and the third, he didn’t know where she was. “Yeah, guess that makes sense, an’ guess I see that a little.”
"You guess you see it. Clarice sees it everywhere." Neena couldn't blame her for that. But she also couldn't help who she was. Relationships were complicated and once someone got through her naturally thick armor there was no getting them out again.
She picked up her second whisky and knocked back about half of the glass, then sighed, "It makes her jealous as hell and a little insecure. Which is cute, but I don't know how much more of that she can actually handle. So then she goes and says 'what if we just get married so you stop worrying about that'. Challenge accepted, I guess."
“Do you want to? Or are you jus’ doin’ it to please her? Because if it’s the latter, then you’ll be doin’ the both of you a disservice.” Logan leaned back in the booth and leveled her a look. “Doubts can be poison. Especially if it’s on both ends.”
"Fuck, Logan, I don't know, that's the problem. In the moment it sounded great, then it was terrifying, then it was completely fine. I-I love her, and that's a pretty big deal, but we've all seen what happened to people we actually get married to. The first guy was just using me to harvest my ovaries for crying out loud. Hers turned into a scary kink monster. The dreams weren't really much better for either of us."
Neena wrinkled her nose a bit, and sighed, "When she's the only person in the room the whole world falls away and everything else just sounds like excuses. Then you remember that Kitty's wife died to Cerberus and... the thing with you and Vel, and how do I know my own life is going to be any different? It's not like I work a desk job."
Logan grunted again, nearly choking on his beer. Neena just said the love word. Out loud. In public. That was serious. That was super, super serious. He cleared his throat. "I don't regret Vel. Cept maybe I coulda handled some things different. Hindsight an' shit."
He held up a finger so she wouldn't talk and so he could drink his beer without another spit take. "You have to weigh ... a lotta shit. When you ain't worryin' are you happy? Could you see yourself in ten years assumin' the mutant gene don't get either of you killed?"
"I can't see myself anywhere with anyone in ten years. I don’t see a lot of people making it that far. Except maybe you. I figure you and your kid will still be kicking around and the rest of us will be dead." That was the sad state of mutant affairs and their genes, that got them killed regularly. Every single future Nate had ever told her about had been that way. Only a few people ever survived it. Logan was usually one of them.
She snerked a bit and twirled her whisky glass around on the table top, "Kitty probably. Maybe Rachel, unless she blows up and puts us all on the extinction list. I don't think that'll happen but half of the bad futures revolve around the Phoenix screwing it all up for us. Clarice has portals. She can kick ass. She's tough as steel underneath that pink skin, but..."
"It's me. It's my own survivability. I always kind of figured my life expectancy was pretty low, and we're hitting the years I didn't think I'd see."
Logan smiled, lips a little tight. He wasn’t sure he’d be around in one year, let alone ten. Not the way things were going. “Don’t mean you won’t see ten. But lets say you do survive. What do you see? An’ don’t tell me you ain’t thought of it. I’m askin’ you to think about it now.”
It seemed like a faked smile, and Neena squinted at him a bit before turning her attention to his question. In ten years, if they were all alive? She had to close her eyes to even picture it. But she'd be old and ugly and probably sagging in places, and Clarice would look amazing and young, would she still appreciate an older woman then? Booker and even Logan had shown her how appreciated a younger lover was. Hell, she was practically robbing the cradle, herself.
It made her chew on her lip a bit, and she shook her head, "I can't do this."
“Why?” He shot back, taking a bite of his steak and chewing it to force her to speak to fill the resulting silence. He’d never think she’d be ugly. She could be 80 and probably hotter than many 40 year olds.
"Because..." She started, then found herself fumbling for the words. Her own steak was going to get cold if she didn't start working on eating it, so she turned her attention to cutting it up while she tried to get her words out. Maybe she just needed to be blunt.
"She's barely in her mid twenties and I'm pushing forty. And I've already lost enough lovers to younger women. I know that's fucking hypocritical since I'm engaged to one myself, maybe... still... but that's different. I didn't leave an older woman to go sleep with an underaged one. What if that happens again? She's going to be in her mid thirties with these tits as hard as rocks and I'm going to be sagging and in a wheelchair or something. She won't even-"
That was exactly the shit that Clarice had proposed to her to prove, of course, and Neena rubbed at the back of her neck, "See, she keeps telling me it won't happen that way. That's part of the bullshit she thinks getting married will fix."
"Darlin' you already look like you've got the body of a twenty-eight year old. With the way you exercise you ain't gonna fall apart. Fuck, I dreamed you got deaged once. Who's to say that won't happen? Not that you needed it you already got tits hard as rocks." He chewed, loudly, getting steak juice on his chin.
"But is that why she wants to get married? Because that ain't right."
"That's not her real reason, no. I just think that's the reason she's getting me to agree to it with. The other ones - love, the future, that kind of thing. She knows those ones won't do it. She's a sneaky little troll." Neena's words were said with a tone of adoration, and it was clear she wasn't that annoyed.
But she continued to rub at the back of her neck with one hand as she speared some steak with the other, "And my hard as a rock tits didn't stop other people from straying."
“That ain’t on you. That’s on them,” Logan pointed out. “You kept chasin’ after Nate, even knowin’ what he’d do to you. That parts your fault.”
"I just can't quit him. It's not even a... God." Neena winced a bit and put her fork down. The growing headache she was experiencing wasn't conversation related. She was starting to realise that it was that damn buzzing she got when the chip tried to interrupt her powers.
"We have a lot of water under the bridge, me and Nate. He's never going to love me again and I'm never going to stop caring about him. It doesn't mean I don't love other people in the meantime."
“Yeah. So why do you keep sabotagin’ yourself. You’re worse than I am an’ that’s saying a bunch.” He smirked at her.
"You're such an asshole," Neena grumbled. The buzzing was getting worse, and that could only mean trouble. She glanced around the place, trying to see if anything looked suspicious or out of order.
"Finish that last bite of steak, we're about to have company I think."
“Fuck,” Logan said. He tossed the last of his steak down his gullet, then washed it down with the last of his drink. Then he licked his knife, because he might need it. And he didn’t want to waste steak juice on stabbing some guy. “Okay. I’m good.”
Well that was kind of strange. Since when did Logan need a weapon? Neena squinted at him while she devoured the last of her own steak. All of her senses were on full alert, though she figured Logan would smell them coming before she noticed them.
One of her hands worked its way inside her jacket, and rested on her pistol, "Yeah. Like you need a steak knife to stab someone. What, are you switching things up today? Popping claws got too boring?"
“Exactly. Need to switch it up every once in awhile.” He flashed her a grin, before turning and burying the knife in a man’s arm as he tried to sneak up behind him. He kicked the man away, just as the bar devolved into a full scale battle.
"I'll stick to my guns if you don't mind," Neena grumbled in return. The bar devolved into chaos so fast that she wondered briefly if half of the patrons had been Cerberus plants the entire time. Maybe they'd just been itching for a fight. She got like that a lot, so it's not like she could judge.
With her powers going bonkers, she had to aim more carefully, but she pushed the table over to make herself some cover and started shooting anything that looked like it was going to attack Logan. He could handle being the meat shield, right? She'd buy him some drinks later.
A broken bottle sliced through Logan’s bicep, and he returned the favor by slashing his steak knife across the man’s face. He lept out of cover, barreling through several more and clearing a path for the people caught in the crossfire to escape. Someone came up behind Neena, and he flung a chair at them.
"It's just like old times, isn't it?" Neena shouted, over the commotion. She sounded extremely cheerful and for once it wasn't just bravado. Usually fighting with Logan was a blast. She hardly ever had to fear for her own life, he was fine afterwards, and they'd had tons of fun together like this over the years. In the dreams, anyway.
And she'd been looking for a good fight anyway. She shot at the arm of someone trying to carve another mark into Logan and then got another guy in the leg before he could come any closer, "I missed this."
“Yeah.” Logan rolled his eyes. Neena always enjoyed a good fight and had a reckless streak as big as his was. Only she didn’t have a healing factor, just her ‘luck.’ He hoped it held up better than his healing was.
He cracked his head into one man. “Why is it you’re always invitin’ trouble?”
Her 'luck' wasn't holding up at all. Every time she was in combat it was like she wasn't just fighting bad guys but also her own self. Her head was pounding, but she was having a blast anyway. Even when she tugger her arm aside just quickly enough for a throwing knife to graze past her.
"Ow, Damn it." She shot that guy in the hand - see if HE threw daggers again - then ducked back behind her table, "Why are YOU always around me when I DO get into trouble?"
“We attract it like magnets,” he said. The first cut on his arm was only now beginning to close up, but he didn’t pay any attention as he picked up a broken bottle. “We gotta take the fight outside.”
"Hey, that's not my fault. I was just born like this." Neena replied, though she nodded at his second comment and knocked back the rest of the whisky glass she'd rescued. "So we need to move. Grab the table and we'll use it like a shield."
Later on, when their fight was over, Neena would process that Logan was healing much more slowly than usual. At the moment, though, she was too focused on the fight to notice.
Logan upended the table, and then started to shove it along the ground. “Stay behind me and keep shootin’, darlin’.” He flashed her a grin. Despite his healing factor being weak, this was still a lot of fun.
Okay and maybe part of him hoped he’d just die, but that was neither here nor there.
"Make a quick pit stop over at the bar, I'm gonna buy a bottle for the road," Dom said, while flashing Logan a toothy grin. She was definitely going to keep shooting at anything that came near them. These goons were a little different than the type they usually got, but really weren't any better trained.
In short, they were peons and she didn't feel guilty at all for injuring them.
It could be worse. They could be ninjas. Logan was so tired of ninjas. He threw one guy at his buddies and bolted for the bar. “Hurry the fuck up!”
"Don't be such a grouch, Logan. God. It's almost like YOU'RE the one that's bleeding." Neena jumped over the bar and grabbed a bottle, tossed a couple twenty dollar bills at the tender who'd taken up shelter behind it, then back-flipped back over it while shooting a guy in the arm. Like a badass. She smirked as she took cover behind the table again and held up the bottle.
"Top shelf Jack Daniels. We're gonna have a damn good night when this is over."
Logan was, but he didn’t say a thing about that. He snatched the bottle from her to open it. “Maybe we should call in your girlfriend an’ get the fuck out of here. I don’t feel like bein’ a snowplow.”
"You were the one that wanted to take the fight outside. Want to just make a run for it?" Neena snorted and stole the bottle back from him to take a sip. Then she remembered something while she took out another two guys with her pistol and threw a knife at a third.
"Hey, you know what would be great right now? My gun. The one you were supposed to bring me?"
“Oh yeah.” Logan pulled it out of his pants and tossed it to Neena. “Loaded, safety is on.” Not even Logan wanted to blow his own balls off. “Jus’ figure we could drink in peace. Besides, cops are comin’.”
"Oh baby, I missed you." Neena took the gun and hugged it against her chest for a few seconds, then realised where it had just been and cringed. Her eye twitched for another few seconds. It needed to be cleaned and so did she, and Logan really was an asshole.
She let out a bit of a snort and tucked her current gun back in its holster, then opened fire with the new one. "Just gotta fire this one time... there. Alright. Take the bottle, I'll call the Fiance."
The bottle was, after all, in need of protection. Neena pulled her phone out and dialed up Clarice with one hand while she continued to fire on the goons with the other.
“You can’t go out somewhere without getting shot at,” Clarice said, porting in and then ducking into cover. “Logan, you’re a bad influence.”
“I try, darlin’.”
"You’re just jealous that we got shot at without you. Next time you and I go out I'll be sure to ask for trouble, alright?" Neena flashed Clarice a grin and then smooched her cheek.
"Let's head back home. You can have some of our whiskey and lecture Logan on the finer points of getting me into trouble."