Shades of Wreckage

[Chuck Carmichael] 1
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 9

[Chuck Carmichael] Chuck's general visible emotions are simple, and few - he's cheerful, sometimes hyper, often intently focused. He frets like a Jewish mother (he did have one for a good deal of his life, after all, and these behaviors are learned) and is friendly and affectionate. In some ways, he's like a very large dog. If, of course, said dog could do the things Chuck can. And had thumbs, therefore being nacho-enabled.

That's usually, though.

It's just barely above freezing tonight and it's about dinner time, which means that the coffee shop has a few people running in for coffees on the way home, or pounds for their makers there, but is largely empty but for its staff (one girl at the register, one guy at the espresso machine) and one very tall Virtual Adept. His laptop is with him, as always, but rests in its case at his side; he's fidgeting with his 'berry more or less aimlessly, having already called Molly to ask if she wanted coffee, to say that they needed to talk. It's funny how these things work out, really.

She can see him from the sidewalk as she walks towards the door; he's not by the window, but in a back corner where no one really has need to go unless it's crowded. It's as good a place as any to be - they're both considered regulars in this particular joint, and it's as neutral as any place is likely to be.

[Molly Quincannon] So he called her, and her response was surprisingly curt (if as emotionally complicated as most of her commentary is, so much so that you couldn't necessarily tell what was on top at any given time) when he did: "Yes. We do." So she'd agreed to meet him, and turned up precisely at the time she said she would. She sees him through the window, yes, but she doesn't immediately go to him when she arrives, and doesn't even look at him to start with. Maybe she doesn't trust herself to straight off; who knows?

The first thing she does when she steps in is take off her fogged-up glasses to wipe them clean; cold weather is a bitch for those who have to wear glasses and go into warm buildings from the just-above-freezing outside. After that, without looking in his direction, she steps over to the counter, orders her usual caffeinated monstrosity and takes off her Kermit hat while waiting for it to be made. Some conversations can't be had, or even begun, while wearing a Kermit hat. She collects her drink when it's done, pays and drops her change into the tip cup on the counter, and then looks over at him. There's a short pause (deep breath), and then she strides over to where he's sitting. She sits opposite him, sets her coffee down and shrugs out of her duffel coat. Now she's looking at him. And she waits.

[Chuck Carmichael] He vibrates. He moves. He progresses even as he sits in one spot and though he's not Working anything (more than the usual), his resonance is there, keen. It's an extreme of emotion thing, really; he also fidgets, as if he can't quite contain all the energy he's trying to. He's facing the door so he sees when she enters, but he doesn't rise to meet her by the door or at the counter as another boyfriend might - he waits. Then she's there, sitting and taking off her coat and waiting him out, which doesn't take terribly long.

Chuck believes in efficiency, after all.

"You told Ashley," he says, and it's neither question nor accusation; it's simply a stated fact. "About something that was an issue half a decade ago, and hasn't been in quite awhile." He's quiet then, and his head rises so his eyes can meet hers rather than looking at the surface of his coffee (black, but sweetened with something artificial).

Chuck is far more obvious in his emotions than Molly thinks; he'd warned her when they started the relationship that he takes things slowly, but he's never hidden fondness or affection or amusement or anything from him. Despite his leanings, despite a cool and sometimes clinical detachment from some things, at some times, Chuck is not a man who hides what he's feeling (and doesn't generally do a very good job of it when he tries). Right now? It's a simmering, burning fury.

[Molly Quincannon] She had, quite frankly, expected this. So she's actually fairly calm and doesn't keep him waiting long. "Yes. When you told me, I asked you 'what happens now?', and your response was that it was up to me. You had to know what choice I'd make. I told Ashley about it, the same way as I told her about the Lara thing; so that she could make her own judgements about what it meant to the community, the House, everything. She could have told me that I was overreacting. She didn't, as it turned out, and she didn't think that it's necessarily stopped being an issue any more than I did when you told me." There's no apology in it. She did what she felt was right, clearly.

She sips her coffee. "And you're angry that I flagged up a potential security issue to someone who might have a vested interest in that information."

[Chuck Carmichael] "I'm angry that you took it upon yourself to talk to someone else about something I told you very clearly in confidence, something that could well endanger people who don't have a defense against that kind of attack, if it should come. I'm angry that, from what Ashley said when she came over to my place, you took the worst bits of what I said and turned it into FUD while leaving the bits where the last time I hacked them was before I moved here, just less than a year ago and that they had no current record of me out. When I said 'it's up to you', I didn't think 'what happens now' might include you going to someone I've been giving bits and pieces for eight or nine months and telling her everything in one sitting."

He's more than angry, really - he's furious. Most people don't get to see this sort of intensity from him unless it's directed at a computer, and even then it's not really the same; Chuck generally doesn't do this mixture of worry, fear and anger. He doesn't hide what he's feeling but he does, generally, keep it controlled. Again, that's usually - now, he's fighting to hang on, and Molly's a smart girl. She has to have at least an idea that this is the reason Chuck asked that they meet here, or at least somewhere public and neutral.

[Molly Quincannon] "Actually?" Molly's nowhere near as controlled as Chuck is; she's never felt the need. Now she's equally pissed, and yes, she's letting it show. "I gave it to Ashley as I understood it - full detail, more or less verbatim, no holds barred. And in fact, I included your views on how it might not be an issue. If Ashley took it to a FUD place, that's not my responsibility. I gave her the data; she parsed it. It doesn't hurt that I happened to agree with her assessment on the matter, but I told her because she needed to know. Like she needed to know about the Lara thing." Yes, clearly Ashley is not the only one who sees the parallels there. "You knew I thought that keeping that secret was dangerous. You knew I thought your logic for keeping the secret was absolute crap. You are easy to spot, easy to identify, and while your name has changed, I doubt that has. So if you really didn't think I was going to tell anyone when left to my own devices, particularly not the person I trust to decide whether it's a valid community concern or not, you don't know me very well."

[Chuck Carmichael] "Lara has someone actively hunting her. I do not. Despite current public - because I suppose that's what it is now - opinion, that is a rather large difference. That you trust Ashley has nothing to do with it; so do I, obviously, or I wouldn't have told her anything at all. I would have stayed for a few months and then gone somewhere else, like I've been doing for half a decade. I sure wouldn't have started making friends with people or tried on this whole meatspace . . . study group thing."

Here, he pauses, sighs, fidgets with his cup and ruffles his hair, takes a deep breath, wishes his coffee were something more alcoholic, and then continues. "I get your why, I guess. I don't get why you couldn't let it be. I've been laying low and keeping my nose clean since I got here, and I really doubt anything in their database has changed. I also really doubt the team here is the same one as the ones who were after me in Boston. The world may be awfully small when it comes to us, but it's bigger than all that."

[Molly Quincannon] Molly rolls her eyes. "It probably isn't the same group, and the world may be big, but information is global and has made the world a lot smaller. You know that. Just because they're not the same specific people doesn't mean that they don't have access to databases. They have no proof of your death, so you're probably still on a watch list at minimum, and if your description came up..." Then she sighs and adds, "We've had this discussion. You know the viewpoint that says you should have told us up-front about this. I know I've explained the logic that says we needed to know just so we could take what precautions seemed appropriate. I'd be surprised if Ashley hadn't done the same. So there's really no point in rehashing it. You're going to ignore it whatever, so why bother? And incidentally, it's not exactly common knowledge. Emily knows details courtesy Ashley, and I told my crew and Israel, who may have told the Guardians, but for the most part, it's being left at 'one of us is a possible surveillance target; take precautions'. So it's not exactly being spread willy-nilly."

She swigs her coffee and then says, "On the subject of Emily ... I have to ask. If you're so big on your own security and privacy, what in the world makes you think it's okay to go poking around in Emily's past, whatever you did with the information you compiled? And I'm also curious as to whether I have one of these 'let's nose in it myself but keep it out of general view' dossiers. I doubt it, as you haven't handed me a flash drive and I've got nothing that needs hiding, but given the situation, I felt it prudent to ask."

[Chuck Carmichael] "Are you . . ." He stares at her, incredulous, when Molly rattles off the list of people she's told; she can see the flicker of panic across his eyes, can practically hear his brain start ticking the things he needs to pack versus things that can be left by the wayside. "So by 'not being spread willy-nilly' you mean 'everyone in town knows'. Jesus Christ."

This actually has him standing, pacing for a moment - he needs to get up and move or he's going to explode. And even in this, in his anger and worry and stress, there's not a second when he seems like anything other than everyone's best friend. It's on the return trip, as he's sitting back down, that Molly asks about Emily and he looks up at her almost as if he's been slapped. It's startling how fast his face hardens, how cold it can look, and how much that doesn't take away from his general aura of friendship.

"I didn't have to dig for most of it; that was pretty much the point. What I did have to dig for, I didn't have to dig hard. And now no one can get at it but who she gives clearance to, so while I appreciate your concern, that's between her and me. If she still thinks it's an issue that needs talking about, she knows where and how to find me."

[Molly Quincannon] [[Oh, hell with it. WP.]]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 3, 3, 4, 5, 6 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Molly Quincannon] "No, not everyone in town knows!" Oh, that's more or less it, as far as Molly's concerned. Yes, his general aura of friendship is still there, but it seems more and more like a crock all the time. "I told my crew because it's my crew remit, and I don't lie to my crew, or keep things from them, okay? And they, like Israel and like Ashley, aren't going to go spreading it around naming you as the source of concern because they don't want to start an active witch hunt, eff-eff-ess! Plus, I think we've already explained that people not knowing will not make you safer. If you choose not to believe that, fine."

And then the bit about Emily, and her hand tightens around her coffee. She does not throw it in his face. No, she does not. Nor does she slap him. But that's a killing stare she levels at him, so it may have come very close. "Well, Emily thought it might very well concern me, given as how this seems to be something you don't mind doing to your girlfriends without their consent. So there it is. I thought I'd ask. Don't worry," she snarls. "I know you didn't do that to me. I don't rate high enough for that kind of treatment, anyway, and I never did. But the fact that you violated the privacy of someone who would have told you all that detail if you'd asked - she sure as hell told me when I did - for whatever reason you chose to ... how do you justify that in your security-conscious, privacy-sensitive head? Without even telling her you were doing it?"

[Chuck Carmichael] "Oh, so she didn't tell you the part where she wouldn't talk about it, but would freak out and was showing all sorts of PTSD symptoms. Or that I didn't actually read any of the stuff I had to dig for - to this day, I don't know what those files say. Or, for that matter, that she was my second. girlfriend. ever. Not that I would expect you to care, mind, when you were busy lamenting over whatever the hell problems you have with our relationship that you haven't bothered to tell me."

There's a breath, but no time to interject; his face is flushed though he's at least half forgotten they're in public, now.

"Emily wouldn't tell me - or anyone else, that I know of - anything at the time, sweetheart." There's a harsh, sharp spin on the word that makes it so very different from the endearment it had been not so long ago. "You forget, you came onto the scene six, nine months down the line, after she let Ashley in her head to help her sort shit out. After a couple months of Jarod-or-Chuck, Chuck-or-Jarod, after we broke up - mutually, I might add. So before you start jumping on this line, make sure you have all your files in order because they're totally not right now. You'll have to forgive me for calling bullshit on about half of your tirade - or not, but it doesn't really matter. You. weren't. here, and you're awfully quick to base your perceptions on one side of an argument I wasn't aware existed."

Now, there's a break and it registers that there'd been questions somewhere in that mess; he doesn't justify the bit about how she rates (or doesn't, as far as she's concerned) with comment. It's news to him that she'd been jealous of Emily, if that's what it is, or was, or whatever; he'd never claimed to be good at any of this and had, in fact, said the opposite many times. When he answers the question, though, it's deflated - he hasn't been loud at all through this, has in fact been perfectly modulated [controlled] for their environment, but now he's quieter as he rests elbows on the table and rubs his temples.

"It was supposed to be a surprise. I thought she'd be pleased to have all that disappeared, encrypted and password protected. I told her at the time I hadn't read it, and I still haven't - all I know is what she saw fit to tell me, without me ever suggesting that she might be a security breach. I took something that was at least semi-public and made it secure and private, not that I need to excuse myself to you. Do you have more accusations, or are we done?"

[Molly Quincannon] "Oh, bite me," is the response to most of that. "I can go on what information I am given. When people are not giving me any information and I am getting details from people to whom you may not have adequately explained a few things - like that you hadn't read any of the details, for example - and who don't feel that their bout of Ashley-therapy was any of my business, then I can only go on what I know. So we each have sides of an argument and you are still specifically missing the point that if someone had rooted into your past because no one would tell them anything and then presented the details to you as some kind of gift, you wouldn't have been particularly pleased either. I take it missing the point is how you maintain that whole easy-going ... thing you've got going on."

Like him, there's a breath taken but no time to interject. "You want to talk about calling bullshit? You talk about the massive problems I've been having about our relationship - if indeed we even have one or ever did, the way you've been addressing it - and how I haven't told you? Seriously? Are you blind? You are supposed to be Mister Empathy and if you haven't seen me being unhappy or at least confused as hell but trying desperately to sort state out in my own head because you made it perfectly clear how things were going to be and not a damn thing I was going to do or say would change it or do any good at all, then you're suffering from a really bad case of false advertising. So you want to know my problems here? Okay. Fine. You've given me the impression that you would have - with sorrow and resignation, maybe, but still - left me in that basement until you figured out the perfect plan. Yeah, that kind of hurt. You show no interest in my worldview, you do not try to understand where I am coming from, and your idea of progress - in terms of 'us', anyway - is utter bull. Yes, I know you said you moved slow, but when 'I love you' gets a look of surprise and no other acknowledgement? I take a hint after awhile. Besides, after this, I don't imagine that you're much enjoying the sight of me. To be fair, I figure you could take me or leave me before this."

She doesn't get up. She clearly wants to, but she just as clearly feels that he deserves a chance to address her rant. "So you tell me. Are we done? Because I know I am." How far she means that is difficult to say, but she's not troubling herself to hide the rage and pain and sorrow and screaming desire to throw her coffee across the room.

[Chuck Carmichael] "Honestly? If I let someone in enough to know there was something that maybe could benefit from being obscured, I think I'd react more the way Emily did if they did it. But see, while they don't have any proof that I'm dead, they don't have any proof I'm alive either, and there are no tracks of the person they were looking for then anywhere, because you may not have noticed, but I'm the guy who does that clean up. It's nothing to most of you, I know. And it's superfluous now anyway, but it wasn't always. Emily's files? I didn't explain anything. I told her flat out what was on that drive, and that I hadn't read anything but her name in any of it. Didn't seem like there was any further explanation required."

Molly obviously wants to get up, and Chuck is obviously tired of this. "The easy-going thing that you take such exception to isn't a thing at all, but whatever. The basement . . . I'm glad to know that you're of the opinion that I can't weigh options and come to an optimal conclusion in a timely manner - is that in general, or just under pressure? I'm a bit curious, now - and that you think the whole swashbuckling thing is a more viable avenue of action than anything else. I guess that's about as important as the worldview that bullshit I've shown no interest in, or the fact that you've all but told me that mine is wrong on more than one occasion and did again just now. I'm sorry that I'm not moving on your schedule," that, so obviously sarcastic, "or whatever. What was Megan's line? Something about lack of ambition, blah blah blah. It'll work well enough as your excuse with minimal alteration. What did you want, really? For me to set everything that matters to me, everything that's happened in my life, aside and just move at your pace? Because dude, even with the woman I was engaged to I didn't go from zero to 'I love you' in three months."

There's a sigh, and through all of this he's been talking to the sheen of oil on the surface of his now-cold coffee. "I'm pissed, and quite frankly, right this minute I'm not particularly enjoying anything. The Mr. Empathy," wry, "in me says you already have a back up plan if I say I am done for all values so . . . yeah, do what you have to do. You're clearly not happy, and I could keep trying to find middle ground but it's kind of pointless if that's not enough."

[Molly Quincannon] At this point, Molly's as tired of this as Chuck is. More to the point, she's just tired. "See, I know that you are clean-up guy. I know you are not swashbuckler guy. I know all that and I knew it going in. I knew it wasn't fair to expect you to be anything but who and what you are. That does not mean that it did not hurt. You seemed to want to know what my 'lamentations' were, just by your last few comments, so I told you. The reason I wasn't telling you outright before ... well, that was respect for your boundaries. I did not, and do not, expect you to change. Nor did I honestly expect reciprocation to the L-word thing. I said 'reaction', not 'reciprocation', and I don't have a schedule. And again, intellectually I get all that, but that does not make it hurt less. See above as regards respecting your boundaries and not expecting you to change. I didn't tell you any of this because I did not want to make it seem like I only cared about you if you were willing to change for me. Which, by the way, is not the case. I kept my mouth shut for you, eff-eff-ess. For your benefit. To make your life easier. To deal with issues that were mine to deal with in my head, hurting as they were, because intellectually I understood that they were part of the man I fell in love with. Yes, I use that word easier than you do. I do a lot of things easier than you do. Emote, for one. But I'm not you. So forgive me if sometimes I will tell you what is going on in my heart, even when my head's vetoed it several times as a conversational topic."

Then she shrugs. "Thing with you - I won't even say 'problem' because it's how you are and that's generally fine, for varying values of fine depending on the other in the equation - is that it's hard to get a fix on what you consider middle ground, or what progress you've made in finding it. I've been trying to move at your pace but your progress - while I know it exists; it's all over you - isn't something that other people can see unless you show them the work in progress. How am I supposed to know what efforts you've made in finding a middle ground? I know comparatively little about your past, even now, at least in terms of how you deal with the romantic stuff, and I don't know what you're thinking without specialist help that I won't use on people without their permission. I've thought about just asking for a one-to-ten scale, but I didn't want to bust past your boundaries, but ... I honestly thought that you were just happy to be coasting and dating and ... I didn't know what you were working through in your head, any more than you knew what I was working through in mine. I still don't. The main reason I'm not happy is because at the very least I consider you a friend and if this is the end of that as well as the search for a middle ground that I couldn't even see happening, then my 'what I have to do' mainly involves going home, blowing something up, wrapping myself in my bedspread and crying for three days."

Then she tilts her head and looks at him, more than a little bemused. "What do you mean, 'back-up plan'?"

[Chuck Carmichael] "So because you couldn't see it . . . what? I did show you. I let you stay the night at my place, and I stayed the night at yours. And again with implying that your way is so much better than mine. You want to know how I deal with the romantic stuff? My first girlfriend ever was Megan. We met freshman year of high school and both went to Boston for college. We got engaged third year, and she broke it off the first year of grad school citing a lack of ambition and why was I wasting all my potential working at Best Buy and really, why hadn't I outgrown Steve - who's been my best friend since second grade, and still keeps an eye on my family for me, and is the one connection I have to that world - yet and left with the ring. Last I knew, she was engaged to the president and CEO of a Fortune 5, not 500, company. I didn't have another girlfriend until Emily, seven years later, and that moved so fast it terrified me, especially given all the other stuff going on. You can see how well that turned out, obviously. And then."

There's a snort here, bitter.

"Then there was you. Is you. Whatever. And I don't know what your back-up plan is, but you don't seem the sort to not have at least an idea of what's next. Which is okay, some people are better at that than others. I'm only good at it when it comes to coding and processing. So . . . I don't know. I wasn't coasting. And friendship is more important than anything else - it's never the least in any equation."

[Molly Quincannon] Molly listens. At least there is the fact that she listens. She listens well, and tries to take in everything. Unfortunately, while all of what she hears does touch her in some way... Well. "I'm not trying to imply your way is better! I was trying to--" She puts a hand to her forehead. "Argh."

Then she turns her attention to her cold, mostly untouched coffee with a sigh. "We're ... at an impasse here. Maybe you tried to show me. Maybe I didn't recognise it as such, and I should have told you - in gentler terms than this - that I did not understand what you were trying to tell me. I shouldn't have left it this long to do so. But to tell me that you showed me after I claim you didn't should indicate that I didn't recognise what you were showing me for what it was, but instead of addressing the obvious communication problem that entails, you just ... okay."

She shakes her head, and she's still not looking at him. "I think it's safe to say that we've got communication problems. Just in general. I ... think I get what you mean, but I don't know what you want, what you'd prefer. I don't even know if you do. My what's next? Is to put the ball firmly in your court."

She shrugs into her duffel coat. "It's late," she says. "They want to close up." And indeed chairs are starting to go up on tables and they're getting sidelong looks from the staff. "Go home. Think about what you actually want. I'll do the same. If you want my friendship, you have it, always. If you want more ... we'll talk about it. I don't know what more we can do, but whatever it is that we do, it's not going to be done tonight. But I think we both need time and we both need space. So we do what we do, and we see where we go. But I'll leave you to make that next call. Video games if you're happy without me as a romantic presence in your life, dinner if you want to talk about trying to find a middle ground on something more." She stands, sticking her Kermit hat on her head (and is past caring what picture she paints in it, in this conversation). "I don't know where we'll be by then, but I think we both need space to consider this. Does that work?"

[Chuck Carmichael] "Yeah, that works," he says, and stands, gathers their cups, takes them to the side counter for the barista to grab and clean before returning to his chair for his own coat (Carhartt, an ugly but warm thing made for working in barns in the winter) and his laptop; his 'berry hasn't left his hands through all of this. (In fact, he's clung to it rather like one might to a lifeline, or a security blanket. And for all that he's done reasonably well getting his thoughts across, she's seen more of the shy, awkward kid he once was tonight than she has . . . ever, previous.)

"And yes, I understand that we have communication problems, and that some of them may well revolve around not having taken much time to get to know each other before we started dating, and more. I believe in progress, obviously, but progress needs a foundation and security, too."

Now, though, they're headed towards the door, and he's giving the workers an apologetic (charming, the sort that most people would forgive anything) smile and an extra tip, promising to be back in a couple days. "Did you drive? I'll see you to your car." Chuck took the el, and he's already relishing the thought of walking to the stop.

[Molly Quincannon] [[Before I write my wrap post, I shall roll Dex + Drive. +1 for emotion and, in all fairness, +1 for weather.]]
Dice Rolled:[ 4 d10 ] 1, 2, 3, 4 (Botch x 1 at target 8)

[Molly Quincannon] Molly, who is at this point actively trying to disappear into her duffel coat (which is really no more attractive than his ugly-but-warm thing), just shrugs and mutters, "I drove, yeah, but ... don't really need an escort. My car's impossible to miss." It's clearly not that she does not want his company; she just doesn't want to want it right now. Like him, she's relishing the walk, if not necessarily the drive.

Which is only fair enough, seeing as how Molly manages to hit a patch of black ice and manages to skid into a ratty Bronzeville front yard. And, given the showpiece that her car actually is, there's the remotest chance that someone's next day EPIC FAIL post involves a suspiciously TARDIS-esque Beetle half-embedded in someone's decorated front-yard Christmas tree with a snowman's head perched on the roof. Thankfully, the injuries to driver are not overly severe, and at least Molly has a brief Emergency Room trip (those airbags are a killer) and a lot of repair work on the TARDISmobile to distract her from recent events.