This is probably a bad idea. What good can come from getting involved with someone who has schematics of the whole city? ... Other than schematics of the whole city.
As an outsider, Logan only has a vague understanding of Sofia's reputation. Mostly in the form of warnings. Warnings he might have listened to a few years ago. These days he's not exactly squeaky clean himself.
Which is why he's at a particularly exclusive restaurant in a tailored suit, watching the people around him as he waits for Sofia to arrive.
There are many things Sofia can be accused of. There are many things that Sofia is accused of. Sometimes, that intersects.
One of the points that it intersects is that Sofia is an incredible dresser.
Moreso now, than before she was committed to Arkham. Before she was a good dresser, but always trying to hit the right tones of respectability. Lots of wide swirling skirts and three piece tweed suits. But now, with the joy of getting to wear anything else but an orange jumpsuit -- well, now. If she was going to be tarred and feathered as a bad girl, she was going to dress how she liked, with none of her previous concerns.
She sweeps into the restaurant, trailing a coat of feathers. Shrugs her jacket off at the chair, sits down, grabs a bottle of wine and necks it.
Logan had been ready to stand and pull out her seat, to play the chivalrous gentleman. He doesn't get the chance. Sofia is like a whirlwind. He barely gets the chance to stand before she's already seated and trying the wine... in a rather unorthodox fashion.
It's so bizarre that it's oddly fascinating. Logan watches with a tilted head as he slowly seats himself back down.
Forget the wine. Sofia is digging in, tearing the bread rolls apart, shoveling it down mercilessly. Once, she drank wine and used the correct fork, smiled and presented herself like a proper Falcone daughter should. No matter that the legacy of the Falcone family was death and dope, with a sideline in clubbing and girls. Carmine Falcone was insistent on manners and appearance, and Berto came up all the shorter compared to Sofia's poise. Cigarettes were smoked discreetly, out of shot.
But now, she's the Hangman. The terror, the killer of Gotham. No matter that she's not, she did the time, and no one's willing to listen to her anyways.
So, style counts. Rules don't. And there's a style in stuffing the breadbasket into her mouth with her hands, as her couture train swishes around the legs of the seat. In the hush of the restaurant.
"I'm glad you like it." Though he says so distractedly as he continues to watch the strange scene unfolding in front of him.
He'd heard rumours and seen newspaper articles, but neither of them really prepared him for this. Whether she's doing it intentionally or not, Sofia is defying all expectation, and Logan's not sure what to make of it.
As he slowly comes back to himself he tilts his head, raises an eyebrow and tells her, "There is food on offer besides the bread."
Sofia’s mouth quirks, not quite a smile. She keeps eating with her hands anyway, deliberate about every crude little motion, like she’s proving a point to the white tablecloth itself.
“There’s also air besides the one you’re breathing,” she says, voice light. She tears another roll in half. “There’s a lot on offer,” she says. “Most of it’s overrated.”
Sofia wipes her fingers on the cloth napkin without apology, smearing a constellation of grease across it. She glances at the menu like it offends her.
She reaches for the wine again and drinks straight from the bottle. “You want manners, go have dinner with a priest. You got city plans. I'd say I'm a hell lot more effective than a priest.”
Her gaze sharpens—measuring, dismissive, a blade that doesn’t need to move fast to cut. “You didn’t come here to talk about bread. If you’re trying to steer the conversation, you should get to brass tacks.”
Logan watches. Takes in every little detail, and lets her see that he's taking it in. Not reacting, not giving anything away, just... watching.
It's a performance, but not solely performative. Not a lie, but not necessary either. Antagonising. As a filter, perhaps. To sift through people she encounters to find those she actually wants to talk to.
His gaze slides back to her face.
"I've eaten with plenty of people who can't abide by the stifling rules of etiquette." In other words, he's not that easily scared off.
Although he will remain poised and polite. He takes his glass and sips his wine before continuing the conversation.
"I was curious as to why you gave me those plans."
Sofia chews, slow and open-mouthed on purpose, letting the silence stretch until it starts to get uncomfortable for everyone within earshot. She swallows, wipes two fingers along her bottom lip, and leaves the smear on the napkin like a signature.
“Curious,” she repeats, like it’s a cute word for a grown man to hide behind.
She tips the bottle again, not bothering with the glass, then sets it down with a soft clink. Her eyes stay on him—steady, assessing, bored in a way that’s practiced.
“Because you’re not from here,” Sofia says. “You don’t have Gotham’s leash around your throat yet.”
She leans back, feathers shifting, and her voice goes flatter. Meaner. Cleaner.
“"So now I'm curious too. I wanted to see what you’d do when I put the whole city in your pocket.”
Often Logan is the one using unbroken stares and long silences to unnerve people into giving information away. This is certainly a different way of doing the same thing, but it is the same. So he waits, and lets her continue at her leisure, never breaking her gaze.
The explanation is a curious one too. Considering it from her perspective: Logan is someone of some amount of power, but is otherwise an entirely unknown element. He assumes he is unknown. Or else she probably wouldn't have given him anything.
So... Sofia threw an animal into the henhouse to see what kind of animal it was. And to watch the resulting chaos unfold.
"My reputation must not have preceded me," he decides after a thoughtful silence of his own.
Sofia's expression doesn't change, but something sharpens in her gaze. Interest, maybe. Or calculation.
"Oh, I'm sure you've done something somewhere to somebody," she says, waving the wine bottle vaguely. "But reputations are just stories people tell about you when you're not in the room. Take mines, for example."
She sets the bottle down, leans forward slightly.
"I prefer to draw my own conclusions." She picks at her teeth with her fingernail—crude, pointed. "So. What should I have heard about you, Logan?"
"By all accounts, you've handed the city over to the cruellest man in Albion." A pause before he corrects, "From Albion, I should say."
Reputations are stories, Sofia's right about that. But stories have power. Knowing which ones are popular helps, but being in control of them is even better.
In this case, he's rather curious to see Sofia's reaction, if any. She'd find out sooner or later. He might as well see if there's even a hint of regret.
Sofia’s laugh comes out short and dry, like something scraped from the bottom of her throat. It's sudden and genuine, loud enough that a couple at the next table glances over nervously.
"The cruellest man in Albion is sitting in front of me worried about whether I know his reputation?" She's still grinning, showing teeth. "That's precious."
She grabs the wine bottle, gestures with it. she repeats, tasting the word. Her eyes narrow slightly, reassessing him with fresh interest. "Different rules. Different game."
She leans back, one hand still on the wine bottle, the other drumming fingers against the tablecloth. "Cruellest man." There's something almost appreciative in her tone now. "And you came to Gotham." A pause. "Running from something? Or running to something? Because this city doesn't import cruelty. We've got plenty homegrown. You know I'm the Hangman."
"A girl so bad that I was closed up for ten years. But I'm out now," Her grin sharpens into something meaner. "On good behaviour." she repeats, savoring the melodrama. She takes another pull from the bottle, eyes never leaving his face.
"I gave you the keys to the city to see what you'd do with them. I didn’t hand you them as a gift,” she continues, voice level. “I handed you a map. There’s a difference. Not what you might have done or did somewhere else."
Worried is a strong word, but Sofia is talking so he stays quiet. To listen. To gather information in what she says and doesn't say. In how she gestures as she asks him questions and shares her own moniker.
The Hangman. It sounds violent. Violent enough for her to be locked away. Though ten years doesn't sound like enough for murder despite the implied finality. He'll have to investigate further.
He sips his wine slowly, pointedly, from his glass before asking, "And are you? Cruel?"
Sofia stops mid-drink. The bottle hovers near her lips for a moment before she lowers it slowly, deliberately.
"Does it matter?" She sets the bottle down with a soft clink. "Everyone already decided I am. Judge, jury, the whole city of Gotham."
She picks at something stuck between her teeth again, casual.
"Ten years in Arkham for murders I didn't commit." Her voice stays flat, factual. "But I learned something in there—doesn't matter what you actually are. Matters what people think you are."
She meets his eyes directly.
"So if it keeps people sharp around me? If it makes them careful?" A smile ghosts across her face. "Then yeah. I'm cruel as hell."
Logan tilts his head as he considers Sofia thoughtfully. He sympathises with that, the pain of being seen as something you're not. Or in his case, he hadn't intended on being. Though if what Sofia says is true, she only earned her reputation later.
"How strange... I learned the opposite."
He sips his wine, wondering how much of Sofia had bought into the role she'd been thrust into. How much she enjoyed it, and how much she wished she could get rid of it all.
"I learned that people could decide I was cruel, terrible, a monster... and that it didn't matter. As long as I reached my goal, I could endure things I never imagined, I could do things I never could have conceived of before."
He'd heard that people were versatile, that humans were capable of strength, of surviving against all odds. It was a common enough sentiment, and yet he hadn't really understood it until the last few years of his reign.
"I'm not known here, and I'm happy to keep it that way. As long as I can do what I like. And if people decide to tell stories about me? I suppose I'm in good company, then."
Sofia’s mouth twists, not into a smile—into a decision. She nudges her empty plate an inch like it annoys her for being done.
“How noble,” she says, and the words come out like an insult. “You learned it doesn’t matter what they call you.”
She taps the bottle with one fingernail. Tick. Tick. Then she shrugs, slow and careless.
“Good,” she says. “Keep yourself unknown. Makes it harder to get a read on.”
She grabs what's left in the wine bottle, drains it completely, sets it down with a thunk. “You can endure being called a monster. Beautiful.”
Her eyes cut back to him. “But you didn’t come to Gotham for peace and privacy. Nobody crosses an ocean for that. Here's the thing about not being known—it only lasts until you do something." She gestures around the restaurant.
Sofia sets the bottle down. “So. What do you like to do with a city once you’ve got your hands on it?”
Logan tips his head to one side just slightly, allowing a sigh through his nose instead of pressed thin lips. The irony in her trying to provoke him after he just explained how little the words of others matter shines brightly. Really. After the gift she gave him, he's sure she knows better.
Where she is full of movement, he remains still and quiet. Watching her fidget and comment and eye him over. Watching her size him up. It's not like this is the first time, it's just a different way of going about it.
The question is met with a raised eyebrow that hints at amusement. "You wouldn't prefer to find out when it happens?"
Sofia actually grins at that. Real, sharp, delighted.
“‘When it happens,’” she repeats. “That’s what men say right before they pretend it was inevitable.”
She flicks an invisible crumb off the tablecloth. “I’m not asking because I’m impatient. I’m asking because I want to know what kind of mess I’m standing next to.”
Sofia’s gaze pins him. “So. What do you like to do with a city?”
The grin surprises him a little, but as Sofia explains, Logan's expression settles into a soft smile. It's a fair description of him. A mess. And a fair question.
Another slow exhale and he finishes the last of his wine, signalling to a waiter for another bottle. "I'm going to disappoint you."
Not that he's concerned by the fact. He never asked for the plans. She took a gamble giving them away. Logan's pretty sure she lost that bet, whatever it was.
He waits for the bottle to appear and his glass to be refilled before he continues, so that they won't be interrupted.
"Gotham isn't my city," he tells her. "It's not mine. I don't have any desire to rule it." He takes another, slower sip of wine, pausing for a moment. "But there are things in Gotham which don't belong here. Things which need to be removed. That's what I'm interested in."
Sofia goes very still. The performance drops for just a moment, and something calculating slides into place behind her eyes.
"Things that don't belong," she says softly. Almost to herself. She taps the table twice, slow. “Things that don’t belong,” she repeats. “That’s a crusader’s sentence.”
She sets down the wine glass she'd just picked up.
"See, that's interesting. Because I spent ten years being told I didn't belong in Gotham. That I needed to be removed." Her voice stays level, but there's steel underneath. "Locked away where I couldn't hurt anyone."
Her gaze cuts sideways, then back. “Gotham’s full of things that ‘don’t belong.’ Half the city thinks the other half is an infection.”
She tilts her head.
"So when you say you're interested in removing things..." She lets it hang there. "How do you decide what belongs and what doesn't? Whose list are you working off of, Logan. Yours—” she pauses, letting it sharpen, “—or someone else’s?”
Albion means the world to Logan. If he'd been told he didn't belong there for ten years, it would have made him sharp too. Wary of anyone repeating the words that had caused so much pain.
"People aren't things," he tells her quietly but firmly. "If Albion wants people to return, the queen can command it. I'm only interested in items. Objects."
The people getting in his way won't be treated kindly, but it won't be what he sets out to do. There are enough murderers in the world, in Gotham, without him becoming one too.
Sofia goes quiet long enough that the restaurant noise sneaks back in around them. Sofia’s expression softens into something that could almost pass for polite, if her eyes weren’t so hard.
“People aren’t things,” she echoes, and the words come out like she’s testing the taste. “That’s adorable. Don’t say it too loud in this city.”
“Good,” she says. “Because if you’d said you were here to ‘remove’ people, I’d have taken that personally.”
She reaches over and hooks a finger against the edge of the bread basket, dragging it closer like she owns it. “Objects.”
Her gaze hardens. “You understand how that sounds here, right? Like you’re either lying—” a beat, “—or you’re naive.”
Sofia tilts her head. “So which is it, Logan? Are you hiding what you want… or do you honestly think an object can be separated cleanly from the bodies around it?”
She drums her nails once on the tablecloth. “Items. Fine. Then you won’t mind being specific. What items. What do they do. Who has them. And what happens to whoever’s holding them when you show up?”
People aren't things. It's something he's being very careful to remind himself as he tries to untangle the thinking he fell into while on the throne. Sofia wouldn't understand that. Who would?
He continues to watch and listen quietly while she judges him aloud, and asks questions he's not entirely sure she cares to hear the answers to. It's easier, he's finding, to just wait until she addresses him directly.
"I'm not going to tell you that." Partly because he still has research to do. Mostly because he doesn't want her interfering. She seems the type who would. "I will say that I intend to do things as cleanly as possible, because it's easier when it can be clean. If not?" He tilts his head in a shrug. "I will get things done regardless."
Then he fixes her with a look of his own, so she knows he's being entirely serious. "But whatever I do, it is in everyone's best interests that I succeed."
Sofia laughs—one hard bark—and a couple heads turn again. She doesn’t bother lowering her voice.
“You’re not going to tell me,” she says, savoring it. “But you are going to tell me it’s for my own good.”
She nods slowly, as if he’s finally spoken a language she recognizes. “Okay. So this is how it is.” Sofia wipes her fingers on the napkin and leaves it ruined. “You don’t want interference. You want access.”
Her eyes stay locked on him. “Then understand something: ‘clean’ is a fairy tale people sell to justify blood.”
She tilts her head, reaches for the wine bottle, finds it empty, and sets it down with a pointed little click. “You don’t want me interfering because you think I’m chaotic.” Her mouth curls. “I am. But I’m also local.”
Logan tops up his wine and then places the newer bottle closer to Sofia. He asked her here to thank her, after all. Making sure she has enough wine is the least he can do.
Besides, it gives her something to do while she talks, and she does like to talk. It's a curious thing, being spoken to as if he doesn't know how that the illusion of polite society is just that: An illusion. This is a different canvas, but the same painting.
"I don't want you interfering because you're chaotic," he confirms. "And because there's a chance that anyone who interacts with the objects I'm looking for will live a very short and painful death." He sips his wine, allowing a pause. "I don't particularly wish that upon you."
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
For crashedout
This is probably a bad idea. What good can come from getting involved with someone who has schematics of the whole city? ... Other than schematics of the whole city.
As an outsider, Logan only has a vague understanding of Sofia's reputation. Mostly in the form of warnings. Warnings he might have listened to a few years ago. These days he's not exactly squeaky clean himself.
Which is why he's at a particularly exclusive restaurant in a tailored suit, watching the people around him as he waits for Sofia to arrive.
no subject
One of the points that it intersects is that Sofia is an incredible dresser.
Moreso now, than before she was committed to Arkham. Before she was a good dresser, but always trying to hit the right tones of respectability. Lots of wide swirling skirts and three piece tweed suits. But now, with the joy of getting to wear anything else but an orange jumpsuit -- well, now. If she was going to be tarred and feathered as a bad girl, she was going to dress how she liked, with none of her previous concerns.
She sweeps into the restaurant, trailing a coat of feathers. Shrugs her jacket off at the chair, sits down, grabs a bottle of wine and necks it.
"Good choice."
no subject
It's so bizarre that it's oddly fascinating. Logan watches with a tilted head as he slowly seats himself back down.
"The wine or the restaurant?"
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But now, she's the Hangman. The terror, the killer of Gotham. No matter that she's not, she did the time, and no one's willing to listen to her anyways.
So, style counts. Rules don't. And there's a style in stuffing the breadbasket into her mouth with her hands, as her couture train swishes around the legs of the seat. In the hush of the restaurant.
Between bites: "Both, of course."
no subject
He'd heard rumours and seen newspaper articles, but neither of them really prepared him for this. Whether she's doing it intentionally or not, Sofia is defying all expectation, and Logan's not sure what to make of it.
As he slowly comes back to himself he tilts his head, raises an eyebrow and tells her, "There is food on offer besides the bread."
no subject
“There’s also air besides the one you’re breathing,” she says, voice light. She tears another roll in half. “There’s a lot on offer,” she says. “Most of it’s overrated.”
Sofia wipes her fingers on the cloth napkin without apology, smearing a constellation of grease across it. She glances at the menu like it offends her.
She reaches for the wine again and drinks straight from the bottle. “You want manners, go have dinner with a priest. You got city plans. I'd say I'm a hell lot more effective than a priest.”
Her gaze sharpens—measuring, dismissive, a blade that doesn’t need to move fast to cut. “You didn’t come here to talk about bread. If you’re trying to steer the conversation, you should get to brass tacks.”
no subject
It's a performance, but not solely performative. Not a lie, but not necessary either. Antagonising. As a filter, perhaps. To sift through people she encounters to find those she actually wants to talk to.
His gaze slides back to her face.
"I've eaten with plenty of people who can't abide by the stifling rules of etiquette." In other words, he's not that easily scared off.
Although he will remain poised and polite. He takes his glass and sips his wine before continuing the conversation.
"I was curious as to why you gave me those plans."
no subject
“Curious,” she repeats, like it’s a cute word for a grown man to hide behind.
She tips the bottle again, not bothering with the glass, then sets it down with a soft clink. Her eyes stay on him—steady, assessing, bored in a way that’s practiced.
“Because you’re not from here,” Sofia says. “You don’t have Gotham’s leash around your throat yet.”
She leans back, feathers shifting, and her voice goes flatter. Meaner. Cleaner.
“"So now I'm curious too. I wanted to see what you’d do when I put the whole city in your pocket.”
no subject
The explanation is a curious one too. Considering it from her perspective: Logan is someone of some amount of power, but is otherwise an entirely unknown element. He assumes he is unknown. Or else she probably wouldn't have given him anything.
So... Sofia threw an animal into the henhouse to see what kind of animal it was. And to watch the resulting chaos unfold.
"My reputation must not have preceded me," he decides after a thoughtful silence of his own.
no subject
"Oh, I'm sure you've done something somewhere to somebody," she says, waving the wine bottle vaguely. "But reputations are just stories people tell about you when you're not in the room. Take mines, for example."
She sets the bottle down, leans forward slightly.
"I prefer to draw my own conclusions." She picks at her teeth with her fingernail—crude, pointed. "So. What should I have heard about you, Logan?"
no subject
Reputations are stories, Sofia's right about that. But stories have power. Knowing which ones are popular helps, but being in control of them is even better.
In this case, he's rather curious to see Sofia's reaction, if any. She'd find out sooner or later. He might as well see if there's even a hint of regret.
no subject
"The cruellest man in Albion is sitting in front of me worried about whether I know his reputation?" She's still grinning, showing teeth. "That's precious."
She grabs the wine bottle, gestures with it. she repeats, tasting the word. Her eyes narrow slightly, reassessing him with fresh interest. "Different rules. Different game."
She leans back, one hand still on the wine bottle, the other drumming fingers against the tablecloth. "Cruellest man." There's something almost appreciative in her tone now. "And you came to Gotham." A pause. "Running from something? Or running to something? Because this city doesn't import cruelty. We've got plenty homegrown. You know I'm the Hangman."
"A girl so bad that I was closed up for ten years. But I'm out now," Her grin sharpens into something meaner. "On good behaviour." she repeats, savoring the melodrama. She takes another pull from the bottle, eyes never leaving his face.
"I gave you the keys to the city to see what you'd do with them. I didn’t hand you them as a gift,” she continues, voice level. “I handed you a map. There’s a difference. Not what you might have done or did somewhere else."
no subject
The Hangman. It sounds violent. Violent enough for her to be locked away. Though ten years doesn't sound like enough for murder despite the implied finality. He'll have to investigate further.
He sips his wine slowly, pointedly, from his glass before asking, "And are you? Cruel?"
no subject
"Does it matter?" She sets the bottle down with a soft clink. "Everyone already decided I am. Judge, jury, the whole city of Gotham."
She picks at something stuck between her teeth again, casual.
"Ten years in Arkham for murders I didn't commit." Her voice stays flat, factual. "But I learned something in there—doesn't matter what you actually are. Matters what people think you are."
She meets his eyes directly.
"So if it keeps people sharp around me? If it makes them careful?" A smile ghosts across her face. "Then yeah. I'm cruel as hell."
no subject
"How strange... I learned the opposite."
He sips his wine, wondering how much of Sofia had bought into the role she'd been thrust into. How much she enjoyed it, and how much she wished she could get rid of it all.
"I learned that people could decide I was cruel, terrible, a monster... and that it didn't matter. As long as I reached my goal, I could endure things I never imagined, I could do things I never could have conceived of before."
He'd heard that people were versatile, that humans were capable of strength, of surviving against all odds. It was a common enough sentiment, and yet he hadn't really understood it until the last few years of his reign.
"I'm not known here, and I'm happy to keep it that way. As long as I can do what I like. And if people decide to tell stories about me? I suppose I'm in good company, then."
no subject
“How noble,” she says, and the words come out like an insult. “You learned it doesn’t matter what they call you.”
She taps the bottle with one fingernail. Tick. Tick. Then she shrugs, slow and careless.
“Good,” she says. “Keep yourself unknown. Makes it harder to get a read on.”
She grabs what's left in the wine bottle, drains it completely, sets it down with a thunk. “You can endure being called a monster. Beautiful.”
Her eyes cut back to him. “But you didn’t come to Gotham for peace and privacy. Nobody crosses an ocean for that. Here's the thing about not being known—it only lasts until you do something." She gestures around the restaurant.
Sofia sets the bottle down. “So. What do you like to do with a city once you’ve got your hands on it?”
no subject
Where she is full of movement, he remains still and quiet. Watching her fidget and comment and eye him over. Watching her size him up. It's not like this is the first time, it's just a different way of going about it.
The question is met with a raised eyebrow that hints at amusement. "You wouldn't prefer to find out when it happens?"
no subject
“‘When it happens,’” she repeats. “That’s what men say right before they pretend it was inevitable.”
She flicks an invisible crumb off the tablecloth. “I’m not asking because I’m impatient. I’m asking because I want to know what kind of mess I’m standing next to.”
Sofia’s gaze pins him. “So. What do you like to do with a city?”
no subject
Another slow exhale and he finishes the last of his wine, signalling to a waiter for another bottle. "I'm going to disappoint you."
Not that he's concerned by the fact. He never asked for the plans. She took a gamble giving them away. Logan's pretty sure she lost that bet, whatever it was.
He waits for the bottle to appear and his glass to be refilled before he continues, so that they won't be interrupted.
"Gotham isn't my city," he tells her. "It's not mine. I don't have any desire to rule it." He takes another, slower sip of wine, pausing for a moment. "But there are things in Gotham which don't belong here. Things which need to be removed. That's what I'm interested in."
no subject
"Things that don't belong," she says softly. Almost to herself. She taps the table twice, slow. “Things that don’t belong,” she repeats. “That’s a crusader’s sentence.”
She sets down the wine glass she'd just picked up.
"See, that's interesting. Because I spent ten years being told I didn't belong in Gotham. That I needed to be removed." Her voice stays level, but there's steel underneath. "Locked away where I couldn't hurt anyone."
Her gaze cuts sideways, then back. “Gotham’s full of things that ‘don’t belong.’ Half the city thinks the other half is an infection.”
She tilts her head.
"So when you say you're interested in removing things..." She lets it hang there. "How do you decide what belongs and what doesn't? Whose list are you working off of, Logan. Yours—” she pauses, letting it sharpen, “—or someone else’s?”
no subject
"People aren't things," he tells her quietly but firmly. "If Albion wants people to return, the queen can command it. I'm only interested in items. Objects."
The people getting in his way won't be treated kindly, but it won't be what he sets out to do. There are enough murderers in the world, in Gotham, without him becoming one too.
no subject
“People aren’t things,” she echoes, and the words come out like she’s testing the taste. “That’s adorable. Don’t say it too loud in this city.”
“Good,” she says. “Because if you’d said you were here to ‘remove’ people, I’d have taken that personally.”
She reaches over and hooks a finger against the edge of the bread basket, dragging it closer like she owns it. “Objects.”
Her gaze hardens. “You understand how that sounds here, right? Like you’re either lying—” a beat, “—or you’re naive.”
Sofia tilts her head. “So which is it, Logan? Are you hiding what you want… or do you honestly think an object can be separated cleanly from the bodies around it?”
She drums her nails once on the tablecloth. “Items. Fine. Then you won’t mind being specific. What items. What do they do. Who has them. And what happens to whoever’s holding them when you show up?”
no subject
He continues to watch and listen quietly while she judges him aloud, and asks questions he's not entirely sure she cares to hear the answers to. It's easier, he's finding, to just wait until she addresses him directly.
"I'm not going to tell you that." Partly because he still has research to do. Mostly because he doesn't want her interfering. She seems the type who would. "I will say that I intend to do things as cleanly as possible, because it's easier when it can be clean. If not?" He tilts his head in a shrug. "I will get things done regardless."
Then he fixes her with a look of his own, so she knows he's being entirely serious. "But whatever I do, it is in everyone's best interests that I succeed."
no subject
Sofia laughs—one hard bark—and a couple heads turn again. She doesn’t bother lowering her voice.
“You’re not going to tell me,” she says, savoring it. “But you are going to tell me it’s for my own good.”
She nods slowly, as if he’s finally spoken a language she recognizes. “Okay. So this is how it is.” Sofia wipes her fingers on the napkin and leaves it ruined. “You don’t want interference. You want access.”
Her eyes stay locked on him. “Then understand something: ‘clean’ is a fairy tale people sell to justify blood.”
She tilts her head, reaches for the wine bottle, finds it empty, and sets it down with a pointed little click. “You don’t want me interfering because you think I’m chaotic.” Her mouth curls. “I am. But I’m also local.”
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Besides, it gives her something to do while she talks, and she does like to talk. It's a curious thing, being spoken to as if he doesn't know how that the illusion of polite society is just that: An illusion. This is a different canvas, but the same painting.
"I don't want you interfering because you're chaotic," he confirms. "And because there's a chance that anyone who interacts with the objects I'm looking for will live a very short and painful death." He sips his wine, allowing a pause. "I don't particularly wish that upon you."
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