darkinferno | [ic inbox]

[HIS ACHILLES HEEL IS BEING BULLIED RIGHT NOW, THIS UNFAIRNESS.]

omg
no thankfully
then i would have set his stuff on fire without any warning
also my clothes are cute and fashionable and don't deserve to burn so he's on his own

[Best boyfriend award.]

what can i say? i know my strengths

just don't expect me to start quoting shakespeare at you, somebody else has a claim to that first

i could definitely rescue you from your tower prison though

[This conversation just keeps getting dumber and dumber.]

[Dante's just going to kind of... loiter around his own kitchen, he guesses? He'll hop up and sit on one of the counters, watching Grell as she works, sliding off to grab something for her if need be but otherwise watching and listening to what she's saying.]

I'm glad someone was with Prompto, at least. He's worse than I am about getting into trouble.

[Or rather, his trouble is usually with other people. Prompto's trouble usually seems to be himself versus the world trying to kill him.]

It sounds like you guys were pretty busy.

[Unfortunately, if it were Fai or anyone else with a psychology background, Dante would be more likely to clam up and refuse to talk than anything else. He's not supposed to have feelings outside of smarm and charm and "sarcastic asshole" mode. It's only the familiar names and the influence of everything he's drank tonight that's letting him spill some of it, the names and the alcohol and Arlene tripping on a landmine and bringing everything rushing back.]

i odnt know

ryojis too nuce for hsi own good anywsys

[All of these people trying to convince him that it wasn't somehow his fault... he doesn't understand how he's supposed to believe that, how they think he possibly can. But... that doesn't matter right now.]

im nto goona let the drink ing becom a habit

i know bteter that that

Nope. It's all shut down. I never even got a chance to go down there once.

oh i would not doubt that. i never said i wasn't weird in some sense, just that a lot of other people are even weirder.
it's not that bad despite that. i sort of like being around people and having the background noise.
but you have an apartment is what you're saying.
i know jackshit about the housing around here, this was also just the easiest route.

[He shrugs.] Probably.

Hey, Pen?

Thanks. For listening.

good plan

last time this happened i accidentally drunk-texted a detective on the rpd with a real stick up his ass

[Dante knows literally nothing, he is blind to these woes.]

prompto

are you talking about incest

what readers

who knows? probably only if they let us

the building's weird, it has all sorts of defenses built into it. the stairs to the second floor will turn into a slide if they don't want you going up there, the doors give you an electric shock if you try to pick the locks

i try and check it out every month or so but whether you can find anything useful or not depends on the day

[...who was this meant to go to, Alison?]

is there really anybody out there that doesn't have a crush on lucy lawless

all you have to do is watch an episode of xara warrior princess

[Dante will tell him everything in time; it's just taking him a while to broach the topic. Even though he still carries so much guilt and pain and fear with him, he also feels like he's been wrung out multiple times by Ardyn and Grell already. It's tough to want to open the gates to all of that again.

But he nods at Prompto's question, pointing toward the coffee table. They've made copies for all of the members of their team, a contract between a C. Vanderweele and another party whose name is too blurry to really make out and a stack of blueprints detailing the Retrospec building as it was originally designed. In spite of what they've seen of the building, it looks as though it reaches much further than any of them could have ever dreamed, stretching beneath the city, multiple levels down, and then erupting back into the open outside of the city limits where other buildings are stationed aboveground.]

Yeah, it's there. Some contract and the blueprints for Retrospec's HQ in Tisse. You can take a look if you want.

[For a moment he lapses into silence, but then he'll glance back up at Prompto.]

Did... anything happen? To your team, I mean. Grell said you guys had to blow up a monster.

so it could always get worse is what i'm hearing here

who's your boyfriend i've got a vintage 1960s suit i need to pawn off on someone and it sounds like he'd be the right guy for the job

besides nobody said you had to burn your clothes along with you, wrap yourself in a sheet like the martyr you're becoming

Busy solving weird puzzles that didn't really amount to anything. There was this man named Ronnie, though...and when I checked my phone, I saw something interesting. You know they all have employee numbers?

[she knows she should tell the whole story in detail from the start, but these are all important.]

Oh! And I got attacked by a monster made of ice - that hurt quite a bit. I'm lucky that it didn't rupture anything, though I did lose a lot of blood. That wasn't a fun day.

damn it

i know one of the groups was down there last month but i didn't think they'd seal it all off like that

was this about the shooting range thing we'd talked about?

weirder how? if it's because of retrospec that doesn't really count

yeah i've got a place over in birch hills

unfortunately a couple grad students live right down the hall so i don't get to avoid the college bullshit here either but it's better than a dorm

hopefully you don't find any condoms in the community showers

They all have employee numbers? I didn't know that.

[There's a sympathetic wince when she mentions getting attacked by an ice monster--she's lucky it didn't rupture anything though? His breath catches in his throat, and his reaction to that might be a bit more than she's expecting.]

Are you telling me it stabbed you?

[Dante forces himself to release the breath he's holding, a phantom pang in his side as his brain tries to check in on a wound that's no longer there. There had been a circle of stabbings in their group, and though none of them were done intentionally (...probably; he's not entirely certain about Malik), it's still one source of horror for him. He wants to ask, to make sure everything's okay, but it's obvious already just by the fact that Grell's here, standing upright and alive, that she'd either been healed or recovered naturally by this point.

Still. It's not something he'd wish anyone else to go through.]

guess I should go every day I can with him
it sounds like the place has a mind of its own

More slashed, it got my chest...but I knew as long as I worked fast I'd be fine. Cover it, bind up the area tight, don't overexert myself. I'm pretty sure I could have healed from it on my own given the changes, but...

[but Ardyn had insisted, even as she had tried to protest, knowing the cost of his magic.]

I'm more glad it didn't incapacitate anyone else.

that's for sure

and watch out if you decide to do it that way, i got blacklisted and thrown out of the building when another guy and i tried to stay the night. he got locked inside the building until 6am and i was stuck outside

[But...] The prof insisted on healing it? [He gives her a knowing look.] He did the same thing to me, too.

[He... can't say anything to the second part. Sorry, Grell, he's avoiding that thought.]

tell that to

oh.

goddammit, retrospec.
hey, dante.

i'll never tell if you're planning on using his awful fashion sense for evil like that
anyway i'm just as cute and fashionable as my clothes so it still applies

He did. Told me I was being foolish for struggling through it and that I could have just asked him.

[she shakes her head a little as she works more on the food.]

I didn't want to drain him anymore if he was already exhausted from tending to his team.

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