tushanshu_logs | [Midnight Hotel] February catch-all

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[Midnight Hotel] February catch-all

Characters: Anyone, everyone.
Date: Month of February, 2016.
Location: The Midnight Hotel.
Situation: Catch-all post! Feel free to use this post for anything that happens within the Midnight Hotel during the month of January, using the subject header to label specific rooms or for specific people. See also the OOC note at the bottom.
Warnings/Rating: None thus far.

Now that work on the public console had been completed, the Hotel’s lobby seemed larger and clearer than it had been previously—or it would, save for the decently regular flow of traffic. Most of that traffic were kedan using the Hotel's commons and facilities, but whereas most of those not actively staying at the Hotel were usually gang-members.

This month there are a fair few ordinary kedan from various walks of life—kedan who, in light of the emissaries’ presence, decide that at least presenting the illusion of branching out might endear them to the ambassadors. While the atmosphere is not exactly relaxed, it’s significantly less volatile than it would otherwise be; even the gang-members are on their best behaviour.

As always, great effort is made to inform newcomers of the Hotel’s strict rule of non-violence.

[ooc: The Midnight Hotel’s status page is available here, with the rules at the top and ongoing status at the bottom. PLEASE POST TO THE STATUS PAGE IF YOUR CHARACTER WOULD LIKE A ROOM OR A JOB. Anton will manufacture means of payment until Foreigners are able to properly offer recompense or choose to move out.

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If anything gave her reason to be concerned, it was that he did not meet her eyes; that had only infrequently occurred in the past, and it had not then heralded good things. But for that, she might let things slide. Raine sat back, a faint crease between her eyebrows the beginnings of a thoughtful frown, and in a moment she freed herself of the blanket and stood, touch lingering only a little longer than strictly necessary.

She might well be making trouble where there was none, seeing what wasn't there thanks to the very recent upheaval-- but then, wasn't it better to be sure? Raine offered a hand back down to Solomon, should he wish the assistance getting free of the couch. "Forgive me if I'm reaching, but is something amiss? You seem a little..." Unsure how to finish the sentence, she shook her head just a little, still with that half-frown.

"Nothing--" Solomon sighed. "Nothing I'd like to talk about in a public area." He hesitated and then pushed himself into a seated position, but took Raine's hand and kissed the back of it, more formally than he had been doing lately.

He could have asked Skulduggery to talk--but Skulduggery might have told him the same thing Bakura had. Solomon wasn't sure he would be able to handle that. And it didn't involve Skulduggery, in any case; it involved Raine. If nothing else, Solomon could take away from all this one thing: he didn't want to be Skulduggery, shouldering a burden meant for more than one person due to nothing more than his ego.

If Solomon was still so afflicted, then there was only one obvious recourse: go to the source.

"Our room?" he suggested instead, and though the kiss on Raine's hand had been distant, he hadn't let go of it yet. "I'll get us something to drink." The tea they hadn't had the night before, perhaps.

At least they would not be reprising the situation from December, just after they'd woken; in retrospect, that had been a decidedly poor setting for that conversation. A necessary one, but even so.

"All right," Raine agreed. The need for privacy might bode poorly, but in turn the fact that he was willing to speak of whatever troubled him was promising. Her gaze was drawn down, to the hand he still held; she had not yet made an effort to reclaim it. "I'll meet you there, then."

Another breath, then, recognizing that moving would be necessary, Raine sighed, and squeezed his hand lightly before drawing back to head for the stairs.

Solomon took a little longer than necessary to get the tea and bring it up, owing to the need to marshal his thoughts. Even still he didn't feel quite prepared by the time he came to their room and hesitated, and balanced the tray on one arm to knock even though logic told him there was no need to worry this morning.

He entered at Raine's assent a moment later, putting down the tray where the one last night had been, and was no longer, and took off his coat and shoes. He asked, "How did the rest of your meeting go last night?"

Raine had been near the window, gaze distant, thoughts elsewhere, but the knock brought her focus back to the present moment, as well as earning Solomon a faintly bemused look in the seconds after. That faded soon enough as well, however, at the question. "Not catastrophically," Raine said, with a quirk to her mouth not quite mirthful enough to be an actual smile. She crossed to where he was, intent on the tea. "But there was not much beyond when you left, either. Genis needs some space to readjust, it seems, and I can give him at least that much. In a little while we'll pick up again."

She lifted one shoulder in half a shrug, added by way of explanation, "For him, it had been only a matter of hours since he'd seen me last."

Solomon had no idea what to say to that. Genis's presence ... wasn't precisely the issue so much as the catalyst for an issue Solomon hadn't realise was there--if it was there. He hung up his coat and went to pick up one of the teacups, and sat in one of the chairs. For a long moment he said nothing at all, before finally chuckling wryly.

"I've no idea how to begin that doesn't make me sound like a child or a cad," he said. "I suppose I might begin with asking ... what you intend out of our, ah, affiliation."

He did not get an immediate response; Raine studied him for a little time over her own teacup, equal parts curious and thoughtful. Whatever he was aiming at overall was currently beyond her, though evidently serious, and as much as she might like to have the complete picture first, Solomon was starting here for a reason. Thus, she would begin with what was in front of her, as ever.

"It's a broad question," she said at length. "In the simplest terms, as we previously discussed, I'd rather face whatever lies ahead here with you, rather than without. A little more specifically-- I suppose my intent is to continue to build a relationship based in mutual understanding and attraction, on levels both mental and physical, from which both of us may draw support, sharing joys and sorrows as they come." A tiny smile, which this time was genuine warmth. "Ideally, I'd like to see you safe and happy, but I recognize we live in a world that is not without risk."

If he needed more, he was going to have to narrow his query. "Why do you ask?"

"Because now that Genis is here, I had wondered if you had need of me," Solomon admitted--which was the part which sounded childish. As did the carrying of tales, so to speak, which was why Solomon didn't mention names as he added, "It was pointed out to me last night that your brother will always be the most important person to you. If that's the case--as it should be; he's family--then I'm ... unsure where my place ought to be at this point, if anywhere."

The words were uncharacteristically unsure, almost vulnerable, and while Solomon wasn't looking down his gaze didn't quite meet Raine's either.

Raine blinked. The possibilities she had been entertaining did not approach this problem in any way. She turned briefly to set her tea down safely, before something could happen to it, and thereafter Solomon had her undivided focus. "Solomon," she said, and it was the near-vulnerability in his tone that had her gentling her own. "My brother's presence -- the fact of his existence -- in no way diminishes the love I have for you. Each of you has his own importance: different, not lesser." It was at this point, far too late to do anything about it, that she consciously noticed her own phrasing choices; all she could do was not draw attention to the word.

She crossed to the chair where he sat, stopped only a pace or two away, not pushing into his space but refusing to be anything resembling distant. "Of course Genis is important. Without him, I wouldn't be here in the first place. But... the same can be said of you. Without you, I'm not sure I could have broken Malicant's control, back then. There are things I can share with you that I can't with him; the-- the place you fill is an entirely different one." And now, she noted, she was almost scrambling, chaining thoughts together with less regard for cohesion. Raine stopped there, watching.

Though Raine didn't draw attention to the word, Solomon noticed it. He noticed it a lot, and it struck him dumb--which was alright while Raine was talking, but somewhat more noticeable when she'd stopped. To be honest, it was a little bit difficult to pay attention to anything past that. Valdis had described Raine thusly, but neither Raine nor Solomon had used the word around each other.

"I see," he said, though he didn't, completely, because of that other detail Bakura had pointed out. "I had ... ah ... wondered whether it was right of me to--" He stopped, sorted out his thought process. "It was pointed out to me that I was expecting the same amount of dedication from you as I'm putting into the relationship," he said at last, "because to my understanding, a relationship should have equal dedication from either side. I don't want to be like Skulduggery. I don't want to assume I don't deserve certain rights because of what I've done in the past, because that way lies useless self-flagellation. But it was ... pointed out ... that it was--well, that I shouldn't. Because I don't. Deserve the expectation, that is."

Now Solomon was the one scrambling, and the moment he realised it he fell silent with a grimace. So much for articulation.

"Oh?" Here Raine was on slightly firmer ground; Solomon was laboring under a misapprehension that she could correct. "Why shouldn't you? The ideal is a partnership, which rather implies that both parties involved carry equal responsibility." Though she'd meant to go on, she stopped there as a few things slotted into place at once -- the idea that her brother was the most important person in her life, the way Solomon had wanted to know where he stood -- and Raine concluded rather abruptly that Solomon might well have begun this conversation because she was currently the most important person to him. "Oh," she said again, more softly. The thought was logical enough on one level, she supposed, but it was an odd thing to consider.

Her heart was light in her chest; it felt like a fragile thing. Raine attempted to ignore that and marshal her thoughts back to the initial intent. "I'll always have responsibilities," she said in a moment. She'd always have her brother, the child she'd raised. There would be times he had to come first, but the reverse was also true. "But there is no reason you should not expect or deserve an equal partnership, no. Everything I can reasonably give, I have and I shall. The question is then, I suppose, is that enough?"

"Because I killed you," said Solomon simply. "Because of the people I've killed and planned to kill, and the things I've done. I didn't want to assume I couldn't be worthy of the same level of commitment I'd offer, but I was told it was presumptuous given my past to expect it."

In which case, of course, he'd been wondering at the point of the relationship at all--but now the wondering seemed a moot one, since Bakura's assertion was apparently false. Though he hardly felt as though he needed the time to consider, Solomon still paused to take in her words.

"It is," he said, and a little smile might have been lingering around his mouth. "That was what I was assuming was occurring, but then--well. I suppose Genis isn't the only one thrown off by his sudden presence here."

If he was not apparently quite so set on concealing the identity of his adviser, Raine might well have had to track that person down for a serious conversation as well. "We've touched on this before, to an extent," Raine pointed out. "The first I've long since forgiven; the rest necessarily only you may come to terms with, but-- it doesn't affect your worthiness here and now in any way save that weight which you yourself put on it."

Something eased, at his last words, and Raine drifted half a step closer. "He startled me, as well," she admitted. Shook her head. That would take time, and would not be fixed this instant. Solomon was before her, and she would focus on him. "You were correct in your previous assumption, then. Is there any other matter in which I may set your mind at ease?"

"Forgiveness is difficult for most people to grasp, apparently," Solomon said dryly, thinking of Bakura and Skulduggery and both their idiocies, and then thinking of his father's honest faith. Solomon was one of the few sorcerers who hadn't rejected Christianity because of how he was raised. Maybe that was what would make the difference for him.

Not that Solomon was considering converting, by any means, but the context and the background served as something of a--

He was quite firmly pulled away from inner considerations to Raine's proximity, and Raine's demeanour, and Raine's words, and he took a sip of his tea to cover the sudden smile. If she wasn't deliberately seducing him, she was certainly making a good pretense. "There may be one or two," he said airily, elbows on the chair's arms and tea cradled in his hands, positioned enough to be in the way but easily removed. "Is there something in particular you would care to address?"

"Evidently so," Raine agreed. There were enough of that sort in her world, on both sides of the matter. Honestly. Forgetting mistakes served no one, but neither did dwelling in them to the exclusion of all else.

As to the other matter-- well. She was not exactly intending to seduce him, except in the ongoing sense of their strange little contest of wills, but the peaceful intimacy of earlier had been unfortunately interrupted by practical concerns and the new lightness in his tone suggested the emotional issue was at least somewhat resolved. All this contributed to a growing desire for some kind of closeness. "Let me see," Raine said aloud, considering if she did have anything that would better be addressed now. "...No, I don't believe I have any pressing issues to raise right now."

She reached out; her hands hovered briefly over his, then settled on the teacup, a question in the gesture. "Save that I'd like to be sure you understand exactly how much I want you," she added, matter-of-fact. It was meant in the general sense, to encompass all the senses in which she did. "One or two other matters, you said?"

Well, well, well. That was interesting and far more palatable than the previous emotional turbulence, and her wording made Solomon's heart beat a little faster. He let Raine take the cup, even though he hadn't yet finished his tea. "Nothing that couldn't wait, I think," Solomon said blithely, watching her watch him. "Please do, go on. I should hate for there to be any ambiguity about how much you want me."

A brief pause while she relocated his tea to a safe, flat location, and realized also exactly how her words might have been construed. Which was not entirely inaccurate, but not her primary goal. At the moment.

When Raine returned to stand directly in front of him again, she had at least some of her thoughts in order. "It would be, I agree, a benefit to us both to be precise and clear, leaving as little ambiguity as possible," she said, with a decisive nod. She was smiling, the expression small but warm. "Of course, I'm happy to remind you as necessary, but I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's see. I don't believe I ever mentioned it, but you should know you were a significant part of my decision to stay here, when the opportunity to return home was offered."

It was not something she at all wanted to bring up with Genis, but it seemed like something Solomon deserved to know. Raine leaned forward just a little, her hands resting on the arms of the chair. "I want to wake up to you, day after day," she said, quiet, intent on his face. "To speak with you at leisure, of everything and nothing. And while I confess I am more than occasionally tempted to drag you back into bed when you find it necessary to leave, in the grand scheme of things what matters most of all this, Solomon, is simply having you in my life."

She wanted-- something. To be closer than she was, certainly, but nevertheless Raine hesitated over the urge to reach out, not wholly sure what to do with it.

Solomon had known that Raine had chosen to stay--it had come up, if he recalled, when they woke up from their year-long hiatus--but Raine had never put it quite so explicitly. The way she said it, the fact she regarded him so intently, took his breath away. The actual words took away any hope of a verbal response.

It wasn't often Solomon was at a loss for words. It seemed to happen more frequently the longer he was with Raine.

In lieu of any other response Solomon sat up to kiss her, though it was markedly unlike his usual teasing kisses. This one was almost self-conscious, and soft, and tender in a way Solomon hadn't think he could be or even recognised that he was.

There was, Raine reflected, a certain sort of satisfaction in having apparently reduced Solomon, so typically quick-tongued and eloquent, to nonverbal communication with her words alone. That uncommon tenderness alone spoke volumes. Evidently she'd made herself understood.

She made a pleased little sound against his mouth, prompted by the softness in his touch and the lightness in her heart, and leaned into him, following that nameless urge to be closer. The shift in weight might have been a little awkward, but for the helpful presence of the chair; in short order Raine had wound her arms round his neck and braced one knee on the seat beside him, and was at least halfway to abandoning decorum entirely and settling in his lap.

What had started as a gentle kiss seemed to move with shocking speed into something a little less gentle, and Solomon honestly couldn't tell whether or not Raine meant what he had, only minutes before, half hoped she did. But he didn't. Well, he did--but he didn't. Sex for Solomon had always been a passing but pleasurable distraction. This ... seemed to be far more lasting, and it felt like a reduction to bring sex into the moment.

Still, the position seemed terribly awkward, and after a moment Solomon touched her waist to draw her into his lap more properly, but he broke off the kiss and rested his forehead on hers and murmured, "How do you do that?"

Once she'd found a slightly less awkward position settled in his lap, Raine was perfectly content to remain there, eyes half-closed. This was all she'd sought for now, kissing aside -- his warmth, and the familiar sense of his mana, the faint touch of shadow and the pattern she could describe no better way than Solomon. She could not linger here all day, she knew, but even so, she'd take what she could get while she could.

In a moment it occurred that he'd asked her a question, and it was one she wasn't sure how to answer. "You'll have to be a little more specific," she returned. No teasing about it, just quiet bemusement.

"How," Solomon murmured, turning up her chin to kiss her again lightly, "do you manage so easily to take my breath away?" He felt as though there was an obvious answer there which he already knew, but which some part of him wasn't quite ready to fully acknowledge. Nevertheless, the fact was true and he was content for the moment to live in it without trying to find it--as if the reality would flutter away if he tried.

Even the clarification did not result in something Raine had a good answer for. Instead she simply returned that kiss, made of it a gentle thing that spoke more of emotion than desire to press further at the moment. "I don't know," she said finally, opting for the truth of the matter. She didn't know that she'd expected this, either, back when she'd first realized exactly how much she'd begun to care for him. On one level it was a logical progression -- she'd told him herself she did not commit halfway -- but the sheer magnitude of what she felt for Solomon still occasionally startled her.

"...I am, however, pleased to know I can. It's only fair." He did, after all, do something similar to her with stunning regularity. "If I discover the answer, I'll be sure to inform you."

"That would quite be considerate of you," said Solomon with a small smile. "I don't suppose you can reach both our teacups from here?" He didn't particularly want to move. As much as he enjoyed the occasional leisure, having someone to enjoy it with him was still a novelty.

Raine, similarly loath to move in a way that would change their current arrangement over-much, eyed the desk for a moment before deciding that she could, in fact, reach. She leaned for the tea that was his and passed it into his grasp before situating her own closer to the edge, where it would be more easily reclaimed if she desired. That matter of logistics thus settled, Raine rested her head on his shoulder and breathed evenly, content.

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[Midnight Hotel] February catch-all

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