multiversallogs | You can have my girl, but don't touch my hat [OPEN]

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You can have my girl, but don't touch my hat [OPEN]

Who: Raylan Givens AND YOU
What: Out and about! Let me know where you're running into him.
Where: Mog Hill, mainly, and the environs.
When: All day Coardi
Notes: Despite his inner rage, he'll be friendly and polite enough to new (and old) acquaintances. Feel free to assume he's doing any of the things mentioned below, but if you want him for other plots, just hit me by PM or on plurk (prettiestwhistles)
Warnings: None for now

Raylan is angry. There are some who might argue Baedal has nothing to do with that, but it's different here than it was at home. He's a prisoner, even if his prison is city-sized. Even if he's free to run every morning (like he does) and go to the bar every night (...which he usually does too, though more for eavesdropping and brooding than to get properly drunk). Working for the sheriff feels like collusion, but at least Norrington hasn't asked him to do anything he can't do, so far.

The militia's broadcast had turned his stomach, but he doesn't know whose brain to put a bullet into for that. A criminal, even a band of criminals... you can fight that, he thinks. A corrupt government that rules by martial law - that's something else again.

So he gets up, goes for a run, works his beat, goes shopping for goddamn groceries, spends his evenings in bars, and bites down on how much this place rubs him wrong.

He thinks he'd best not get questioned by the militia again, because he doesn't know if he'll be able to keep his mouth shut. But even those who don't know him well might be able to identify a man with an itchy trigger finger.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"See, that's what I need to do," she says as she takes the offered seat, nodding her thanks. "Find places within stumbling distance from home instead of always drinking wherever I happen to be. I'd say you're a sensible man but I'm pretty sure there's a rule against bringing good sense into a bar, didn't we agree?"

"Honestly, I give you more credit for observation than calling me sensible," he says with a laugh. "What brings you out here, if not the fine alcohol?"

"Well, maybe you just have sensible moments."

She shrugs, taking a sip of her drink. "Trouble, kinda," she goes on. "I was passing out leaflets for the political party. Didn't really have anything better to do with myself right now and I didn't much feel like sitting at home and, like, trying to sleep and failing. Thought maybe the air and the chance to feel like I was accomplishing something might help."

"Did it?" He doesn't expect a real answer, though he wouldn't turn one away if she gives it.

She studies him across the table for a few long moments, as if sizing him up all over again. She doesn't really need to; she decided a long time ago he was trustworthy. And more than just worth her trust, but that she was also willing to give it.

But actual forward movement toward that, a definite move to tell herself that yes, she does trust him, will trust him... well. Is it time?

She smiles at him, warm as ever, but sad around the edges. "No, not really. I think the place is starting to eat at me, a little."

...Apparently, it's time.

"But I'm sure it'll pass. So tell me about this trouble you came looking for."

"I've said I gotta get out since I arrived," Raylan said, lowering his voice. "That opinion's only gotten stronger." In light of recent events, and in light of his longer time to observe the city.

"Yeah." She wraps both hands around her drink, her expression grim. "Yeah, I agree. I kind of lost track of trying to figure out how, for a while, there. I should get back into it."

"It's hard, when you're pushing and don't make any progress. Like you're just shoving yourself up against a wall. Not many people that can maintain that all the time without any kinda break."

"...Do you feel backed into a wall?"

Her voice is soft, her gaze averted for a moment or two; she's not asking out of a sense of getting into his business, or to satisfy some ill-mannered curiosity. She genuinely wants to know how he's feeling, if the place is getting to him like it's getting to her.

She looks up at him, one side of her mouth curving, a faint half a smile. "I'd understand feeling that way."

"Don't know what else you'd call this place." Presumably he means Baedal and not this particular bar. Even so, it's an affirmative.

"City-sized cage is still a cage."

"Yeah. I feel like we're being very firmly reminded of that, lately."

She sips from her drink and lowers her voice softly. "You saw that broadcast? The militia?"

"Yeah," he says, lower and with a flash of the anger he does so well to hide, generally. "Yeah, I saw."

She nods, unsurprised by that anger. She felt it too, though she's practiced at hiding such things. "I did too. That's why I was out tonight. It might not come to anything but I had to do something."

"What are you trying to do?" He knows very well that Rachel is smart and capable, but he's still wary; if this were home, he'd be first in line to protest. Here, he tells himself, he just wants to keep his head down and find a way out.

Telling himself that is not always as effective as he might like.

"Spread information. Because hell if I know what else to do." She scrubs at her face with a hand. "I mean--what else I can do that won't lead to me being the one hauled out of a place in the middle of the night, next time."

"Yeah." He's not convinced, totally, that spreading information won't. But she knows that. "You know, every time I mention I'm at all connected to the sheriff, I see people flinch. We ain't the militia, but it's bad enough no one cares." And maybe he was being naive - maybe they are all connected.

Her face falls at that, mouth twisting in some combination of sympathy and annoyance. It bothers her that good people are being lumped in with what they saw on the video.

"That's not right. But I guess when people have lived under the militia's thumb for so long, it all runs together, rightly or wrongly."

"Could be rightly, for all I know about the place. The people I work with directly, I think they're trying to do right by the population, but the higher ups?" He shrugs, frustrated. "No one's asked me to do anything I can't, but maybe it's just a matter of time."

She studies Raylan across the table, leaning in a little. "What would you do if they did ask you to do something you couldn't?" she asks, concerned.

"Don't know," he says, after a moment, taking a sip of his drink. "Probably something stupid, if precedent's any indication." He says it like a joke, but it's more or less a legitimate assumption.

One side of her mouth quirks up in an attempt to match his joking demeanor, but there's no masking the worry in her eyes. "Hey, I thought I was the one who cornered the market on stupid ideas, here. Drinking far from home, contemplating surfing in that water out there."

The smile fades as she takes another drink from her glass. "I hope it doesn't come to that. I'd like to think there's authority here that's not under the militia's influence."

"It's a nice thought, at least." He's not so much a pessimist as a pragmatist in a place he doesn't like or trust. "Too many unanswered questions still and always."

He finishes his drink, then adds: "You're surfing now?"

"Yeah, that's the nature of the place, I guess."

She raises her eyebrows. "I've always surfed. All my life. Can't do it right now because I don't have a wetsuit, just the board. I'd freeze. And I went and promised someone I wouldn't freeze to death, can you imagine?"

"What a jerk," he laughs. "Doesn't sound like any fun at all."

She makes a big show of rolling her eyes, mock annoyed. "Yeah, yeah, I know. And yet I listen anyway. I dunno. I must like the guy or something."

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