clock w i s e

REMI

the alchemist

What good are hands
if there's nothing that they hold

Resisting the urge to say you just did—though the quirk of his lips very much suggests he thought it quite loudly—Remi nods. Maeve's accent is a strange cousin of those that men such as Ronin and Ianto have, and though it isn't quite the same, the alchemist has had to decipher sleepy, drunk, and mouth-full Ronin (and Ianto, really) on enough occasions to understand the Madame with ease.

Though the monsoons rage outside, in Maeve's apartment the world is cozy and calm. Soundproofed as the walls are, Remi might imagine that it's just the two of them in a little home, rather than a large establishment with multiple rooms likely filled to the brim at this time of night.

And what good are hearts
if you bury them all alone?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Maeve

Maeve huffs, knowing exactly what he was thinking, "Really had to fight the urge on that one, huh?" She mutters with a roll of her eyes before becoming a touch serious, dropping her gaze to stare at his chest. Maeve chews the inside of her cheek, seeming to struggle to find the words or the bravery to ask. It's hard to tell for sure. Outside the storm rages and her emotions swirl to meet it. Finally, she draws a breath and speaks, "How did you know you were in love with Ronin?" It feels like such a silly question. She was the Madame of the Halenani and yet she didn't know what it meant to be in love. What that truly felt like.

Sex and love were not the same thing. They weren't and she new that. Everything that had happened the last couple of months weighed on her. Aurelia, Locke, and now Sunjata. There wasn't time for things to develop with Aurelia. The smuggler hadn't allowed it. Locke? She didn't even know what she was doing with him. They were trying. Whatever that meant. Then there was Sunjata. Who was a mess and falling apart at the seams. Who she's trying to keep together. Who wanted her just as much as she wanted him. It was a fucking mess.

I admit that I'm a little messed up
but I can hide it when I'm all dressed up

REMI

the alchemist

What good are hands
if there's nothing that they hold

'More than you know.' Remi replies, the words chuckled out on a long exhale. Shirtless as he still is, it's difficult for the alchemist not to fidget beneath her stare, dropped to his chest as it is. Even he can appreciate that it's likely just a vague gaze, his scars not under any sort of scrutiny, but he finds his eyes roaming anxiously toward the ceiling just the same.

Her question isn't entirely the one he expected, and his confusion is evident in the slight dimpling of his cheeks as his gaze lowers back to her. "Well...different ways, I suppose. There was the knowing the first time we kissed. That sort of..flush of love that could stay or go, depending." He says slowly, his cheeks blooming with colour at the memory of it. "Before that too, when Ronin died, Safrin...sort of let him..remain? for a few moments. That was when I told him I loved him for the first time, but I certainly did not mean it then the way I do now."

Sitting up straighter and tugging the blankets to his waist, Remi pulls in a breath as he further considers. "I know I love Ronin, because I keep loving him even when it almost kills me, or him, or both. Even when it is the worst thing for us to do." Looking at the wedding band on his finger and feeling the thundering race of his husband's heartbeat, Remi can only assume the Star's talk with the Flood isn't going well. "It isn't just that I would not want anyone else...it's that...there could never be anyone for me, like Ronin is."

Unsure who they were talking about—being close with Sunjata didn't make him the topic of Maeve's question—Remi offers the Madame a small smile. "I think if you have to ask..? Then it is not love. When it is...you know it is."

And what good are hearts
if you bury them all alone?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Maeve

Maeve listens quietly, fidgeting with the blankets that cover her as her lips press into a thin line. She rolls onto her back, staring up at the ceiling as her mind works over what it is that Remi tells her. She didn't know either of them well enough to say one way or the other. There could be love there. Given time. If there was a chance to let it grow. It wasn't instant. Love at first sight might be in fairytales, but this was the real world. Things like that didn't happen and they definitely didn't happen for people like her.

"It isn't that I think I'm in love with someone... I just didn't have anyone to ask about this sort of thing. To be honest, I've had a pretty fucked up perspective on what relationships are. What they're meant to be." Maeve sighs, running a hand over her face before her fingers slip through her hair and finally come to rest back on her stomach. "You could probably tell though." A humorless laugh pushes past her lips and she shakes her head, letting it roll to the side so she can meet his gaze again.

There is a moment of quiet as she considers what else to say. What she can reveal to him. Her fingers find the pearl necklace that rests at her throat, fidgeting with it lightly. "I do like someone. Well, two people, but both are completely emotionally unavailable and I'm pretty sure I'm just going to end up with a broken heart." She finally says, voice soft in the quiet of the room, a small almost tired smile tugging on her lips.

I admit that I'm a little messed up
but I can hide it when I'm all dressed up

REMI

the alchemist

What good are hands
if there's nothing that they hold

'Ah well, I am not sure I am the best person to ask then, if you want a perspective that isn't fucked up like yours.' Remi says with a laugh as he pushes his curls from his forehead. "Especially since I do not remember the relationships I was in, before." Loren and Sam...it was all gone. Even what he had with Ianto the first time around. Looking down on her, appreciating her beauty for what it was rather than the lust it was meant to inspire when they were together in this room before, Remi smiles.

'I heard once that if you like two people at once, you should consider the second one. Because if the first truly held your gaze, you would not have seen the one that came after." It's said with a fair amount of skepticism, yet Remi can't help but smile a touch guiltily. "I was with someone else, when I realized that I wanted to be with Ronin. Leaving him...even being honest about it was one of the hardest things I have had to do." He admits softly.

"But love...you can love someone without being with them. Or love them and know that it will work out. " Remi's accent makes the words sound far more poetic than they have any right to, and even he shakes his head against his own advice. 'Both men and women are idiots when it comes to being emotionally available." He adds, making no assumptions about who might be stealing the Madame's heart. 'That might not ever change.'

And what good are hearts
if you bury them all alone?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Maeve

Her laugh was bright and sudden, making her nose wrinkle and her eyes light up with mirth. It passes after a moment, a smile still tugging on her lips, "You know, fair point. I wasn't even considering that bit." Maeve huffs, shaking her head as she tries to grow more serious. It doesn't really work, but levity it brings to the conversation is appreciated. Her eyes meet him, the soft green of her irises seeming to lighten as she relaxes further. As strangely as their relationship began, it was slowly shifting into something else and with it came a sense of comfort that she willingly sunk in to.

"What if you only met the second one because you were on the outs with the first one? Who you later made up with before they decided to ship off to Stormbreak to become a dragoon leaving you with no one but the second one?" She poses the question to him, bottom lip finding it's way between her teeth for a moment. "Not to mention that the second one is currently recovering from his wife leaving him and his husband going on a trip that he may never come back from and you know you're only meant to be a distraction. What do you do then?" Maeve finally looks back at him, arching a brow as she waits for him to possibly provide some kind of answer to that because she has no fucking clue what she's doing.

She sighs, still fidgeting with her necklace as her eyes hold his, "I've never understood how love was so hard to come by in a world where people are so desperate for it." Maeve admits, voicing something she's been trying to puzzle out for years at this point.

I admit that I'm a little messed up
but I can hide it when I'm all dressed up

REMI

the alchemist

What good are hands
if there's nothing that they hold

Ahh, well. There it was.

Remi doesn't look too surprised as the second one is revealed to be Jata. Knowing nothing of Locke—though how ironic that the man was now spending his days with Remi's husband—the alchemist just lets his gaze tilt up toward the ceiling for a moment as he considers. "The how of meeting someone...I do not think it matters." He says slowly, thoughtfully. "When Ronin and I were apart...there was not a single person who could have caught my eye. Nor all the years we have been together." Chuckling under his breath, Remi raises one of his hands to press his fingertips against his eyes. "At one point, I ended up living with a man that I was in love with before. The man I was with when I fell in love with Ronin. I even slept in the same bed with him every night for weeks, and nothing happened." Sorry Locke. Letting his hand fall back into his lap, Remi turns his soft stare toward Maeve and shrugs.

As for Sunjata, Nate, and Hotaru? It was more complicated in some ways...but not in others. "And with Sunjata...I think two things. What you are to him, and what he is to you...those things are not necessarily linked. You cannot help how you feel." Ruffling a hand through his curls, Remi indeed will keep to his word about not sugar coating things, despite how hard it might be, given how sweet and kind Maeve suddenly looks, cuddled up in her blankets. "But I think what Sunjata and Nate have is real. Even if Nate never comes back...even if this ends them...it will not leave a hole in his heart to fill. It will destroy it." Remi knows this, if only because the same would be true if Ronin was ever not in his life anymore.

Her final question is the easiest to answer though, and it leaves laughter pouring from the alchemist's lips. "Ahh well. Because people do not want love. They want a fairytale. They want romantic dates, and sex for breakfast and all the excitement. But real love is the things in between." Remi says with an almost sweet sigh. "Everyone wants an easy life. And so they want an easy love, too."

And what good are hearts
if you bury them all alone?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Maeve

The how really didn't matter in the grand scheme of things. What mattered was that they had met. That there was a spark and a connection. It was something. No matter how small and fragile that much be. Maeve nods slowly at his words, pursing her lips because he was ultimately right. "I know that you don't have memories of your past relationships, but do you think it was always going to be Ronin for you? Once you met did it just make sense? She asks softly, looking up at him with bright eyes as she draws her blankets up around her.

Then the conversation turns back to Sunjata and she braces herself to hear a hard truth. Remi doesn't sugar coat. He's honest and clear about his thoughts on the matter, voicing something she already knew in her heart. "I know I can't help how I feel. Things have just been so hard for him. I don't want to make it harder. Not when I told him that it wouldn't be anything more than this." That she could do this without developing feelings. That she was just a friend helping out a friend and getting him through this time without Nate. She sighs softly, brows knitting together as her eyes close, "I don't want that to happen to him. I care about Jata. A lot. I want him to be happy and if that means that it's just with me as a friend and nothing more... Well, I'll just have to accept that." Maeve looks back up at him, a faint smile on her lips. There wasn't anything else to be done for it.

He laughs and her smile grows. He's right about this too, of course. Maeve doesn't want an easy love. She wants real love. Sure, all that other stuff is wonderful and she'd like to have it, but she wants the in between. The day in and day out that comes with tying your heart to someone else's. "To be fair, sex for breakfast is wonderful. Can't really blame them for that."

I admit that I'm a little messed up
but I can hide it when I'm all dressed up

REMI

the alchemist

What good are hands
if there's nothing that they hold

The question brings a sad smile to Remi's lips. "I think I would have settled for what I had at the time." He replies, the words just a whisper carried across his lips on a sigh that speaks of pain and melancholy. "The first man I ever thought I loved...he was wrong for me in almost every way, but I had no idea." Gods how he hated Loren now. "And with Sam...it was not right either, but there were moments when it was good. I might have stayed with him." Looking down at his hands, the weight against his throat almost too much to bear, Remi turns tear-shiny eyes toward the Madame. "I would have stayed with Ianto, though. I know I would have. I would not be the man I am now, and I would have been happy to live out my days with him." Would it have been the sort of love he had with Ronin? No. But it would have been sweet and full of endless joy just the same.

"You cannot live your life for others. Caring about making them feel their best might be your job here...but it cannot be who you are. You will never be happy that way." Remi offers, knowing the advice will do little. "As for Jata..." Pulling in a breath, Remi exhales an exasperated sigh. "There are things in his control and there are things outside of it. The things with his father, those are wounds he deserves to have tended to. But everything with this child? With you, right now? Those are things he chose. It is not for you, or Ronin even, to be forced to step lightly when he has done these things knowingly." But of course, that was why Remi was thought of as a heartless monster, and Ronin and Maeve were sweet and good friends.

Grinning wickedly, Remi is about to nod—sex for breakfast was wonderful—when suddenly there is a flash of lightning outside far too bright to have come from the sky. In an instant the alchemist is out of the bed, striding toward the window with little worry for whether his towel stays wrapped around his waist. Hissing in a breath he sees Sunjata on his knees with Ronin's fist at the man's temple. Luckily seconds later the Flood is on his feet leaning against the Star and the pair are walking away together, or Maeve might have found a manticore-sized hole in her wall suddenly.

"Well, it looks like they are using their words." He says with a relieved sigh, tapping a finger against the glass and glancing toward Maeve.

And what good are hearts
if you bury them all alone?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Maeve

A pain swells in her chest when he turns his gaze back to her, tears desperately wanting to fall, but the alchemist refuses them. It's achingly familiar and she reaches out to comforting hand, making sure that she only touches him where the blanket covers his skin, not wanting to add anymore to his inner turmoil. Even still, she runs a thumb back and forth soothingly, green eyes soft as she gazes up at him. In that moment it's easy to see how she draws people in. How she gets them to lower their walls. She has a gift for it. Even if it isn't a gift from the gods. "I'm sorry that you lost that. Even if what you have with Ronin is what you want in this time. To have that taken isn't something I'd wish on anyone." Maeve murmurs and there isn't pity in her voice. It's just an understanding of the hurt he's experienced.

But then he delivers her another hard truth and she draws in a breath. She knows this too. Has always known it. That it might be her job, but it can't be her life. The reminder, while bitter, is needed and once more she finds herself appreciative of his willingness to speak with her in this manner. If only they had had this conversation early. Perhaps she might of found the courage to admit how she was feeling when she was last with Jata. As it stands, she'll just have to face that another day. "I like to think I haven't stepped lightly, but maybe I have. I can't really say." Before she has a chance to speak further, Remi is bolting from the bed towards the window and Maeve scrambles to follow as the room flashes with that stark white blue that can only be from the governor himself.

Her hands brace against the window sill, eyes wide as she stares down into the street, watching the scene unfold. Her heart rabbits wildly in her chest waiting for the next hit, but it never comes. Instead the Star is helping up the Flood, bracing his body and relief washes through her the same way it washes away the blood on the street. She tears her eyes away from the men in the street, looking back up at Remi, "Thank goodness for that." Maeve murmurs before she realizes that he's lost his towel and she turns from him, instead flitting over to the small wardrobe and pulling a robe that's clearly not for her from inside to hold out to him. "Better than the towel, I would think."

I admit that I'm a little messed up
but I can hide it when I'm all dressed up

REMI

the alchemist

What good are hands
if there's nothing that they hold

"I am too." Remi agrees with a stiff nod. "At least he is still in my life. He very nearly wasn't, so...I am glad I did not lose him altogether." He had though, in a sense. The divide between he and Ianto was obvious for anyone with eyes to see it, and for those that didn't? Well. Remi had ever been an open book about such things. Years later though, and it still hurt. It always would.

"You are, if you set aside how you feel because you do not want to inconvenience him." Remi says, head tilted slightly. But then of course everything changes, and Remi is peering out of the window with Maeve at his side. "I almost wish they would just fight it out." The alchemist says uncertainly as he turns the wedding band on his finger. He can feel Ronin's heart thundering against his skin; it wasn't over, yet. "They can hurt each other just as well with their words, in ways that do not heal, like wounds do." He adds with a sigh.

'Ah, thank you.' Remi says with a distracted sort of blush as he shrugs on the robe, tying it around his waist. Around them the monsoon continues to rage, and the Halenani groans with the force of it. Glancing up at the ceiling with a frown, Remi raises a brow as he looks back toward the Madame.

And what good are hearts
if you bury them all alone?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Maeve

Another point well made that has a flush of her own rising to her cheeks, thoroughly chastised by the other man. They were going to need to talk. Just... not yet. Not when this was happening with Ronin and things were still so precarious. She doesn't acknowledge it with anything more than a nod, letting him know that she heard him. It needs to be addressed and she will address it at some point.

"A brawl in the streets is one way to solve things, I suppose. At this point I'm not really sure that Ronin can hurt him further with his words. He's already so broken." She doesn't need to ability to feel emotions to say that with confidence. Maeve has looked into his eyes and seen the fractures in his soul barely hanging on. She sighs as well, shaking her head as she leaves him to retrieve the robe, "Let us just hope that they manage to do this without causing further harm."

Maeve smiles softly, wrapping her arms around her middle and drawing the cardigan she wears more tightly about herself. The ceiling groans and her eyes close, lips pressing into a thin line before she's casting her attention up and finally back on him. "We already have leaks in some of the rooms... At least seven busted windows. I'm not sure it's going to hold for the rest of the season..." Maeve murmurs, moving to sit back on the edge of the bed wearily, dropping her head into her hands. "We made preparations, but I fear that it's not enough."

I admit that I'm a little messed up
but I can hide it when I'm all dressed up

REMI

the alchemist

What good are hands
if there's nothing that they hold

It's a dark and sad laugh that leaves Remi then as he shakes his head. "Ronin and Sunjata have been through a lot together...They are each other's best friend...broken would not even begin to describe what Ronin could do." Nodding his agreement, though in fact words that would linger and hurt had already been said, Remi turns back to the window until the shade of the Star and the Flood had faded away into nothingness.

Wincing at the Madame's report, Remi scratches thoughtfully at his cheek as his eyes scan the ceiling. "How many are here?" He wonders, trying and failing to think of where else in Torchline they might go. The Hanged Man could hold some and perhaps some of the other businesses as well, but it likely wouldn't be enough. Certainly not in a capacity that would let Maeve's staff continue to work.

And what good are hearts
if you bury them all alone?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Maeve

Another heavy sigh pushes past her lips and her shoulders sag, "Too many. I have about thirty five. Twenty five of which live on site. Five of them are children." She's already thinking about where they'll all go. How long it'll take her to get things rebuilt. It could be a whole season before things are operable once more. There are favors to call in. People who would be willing to help. At the end of it all they're going to be losing a home. That trumps being out of work.

It felt like a cruel joke. She becomes the Madame to only have her entire lively hood stripped away. Not to mention her workers. She could handle it if it was only her, but it was them too. No one could stop the storms. "I don't know what I'm going to do, Remi... There isn't anything I can do right now besides try and keep them safe, but I can't even really do that."

I admit that I'm a little messed up
but I can hide it when I'm all dressed up