LOG: [Cain, Haller] At Harry's

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Haller is apparently feeling the stress of the job he no longer actually has, so Cain offers his support. Well. "Support."




"It's the tall one."

"Nate? Not unless he just flew in from Stanstanistan..."

"No, Cain. The other one. The one with the hair."

"Dave? What's Dave doing?"

"Playing darts."

"What's wrong with darts?"

"With his BRAIN."

"I'll get my coat."

It hadn't taken Cain long after hanging up the phone to arrive at Harry's, to see the fiftysomething bartender crouched behind the bar, wearing a 1940's style metal 'doughboy' helmet. The reason for which was obvious as a dart whizzed under Cain's nose. A rack of shattered highball glasses gave evidence to the fact that while Haller seemed to be enjoying himself (possibly the table full of empty beer glasses helped), accuracy was not first on his list of priorities.

"Who's winning, Dave?" Cain asked, tossing his coat on the bar and sliding into a chair next to Haller.

Grey eyes slitted for a moment before Jack turned his attention back to the now-pitted dartboard. At least Cain hadn't called him Jim. Jack tossed another dart into the air. This time the point hit, and the following burst of TK drove it halfway into the wall next to the board. He said, in a voice that was ghosted with the barest hint of a Texan drawl, or at least what a child might have thought comprised one once, "Not the wall, that's for goddamn sure."

Cain looked over towards the bar and just nodded. Harry, taking the hint, headed off to the back, turning off the neon sign that usually lit "OPEN" in the front window.

"How about we slow it down a little, champ?" he offered, reaching over to the bar to draw another pitcher of beer. "You might be smaller, but you got one hell of a headstart on me here. Ain't sporting."

"Word of advice, friend: leave that fatherly shit to the gimp. I ain't looking to buy and you ain't much of a salesman." Jack reached into the nearly-empty box of darts and extracted two. The resulting blow sent one bouncing off the side of the target and the other into the far wall, narrowly missing a window. This was bad control even for him. Too bad he was more committed to giving Jim a screaming hangover.

"Ah," Cain said, nodding. "Got a point. Chuck wouldn't do this, though."

He reached out and sharply slapped Haller across the face. "Lemme talk to David. NOW."

Instinctively, Jack reached to block the blur of motion and -- couldn't. The grasp of telekinesis tore under the open-handed smack like wet tissue paper. The young man was throw almost out of his chair, and then the moment of uncertainty between ego-states was replaced by the vicious rebound of inverted telepathy suddenly snapping back into effect.

"Sorry," Jim mumbled, trying to right himself and keep his head from caving in at the same time. "Here. Sorry." He had the vague memory of property destruction and beer. Lots of beer. Oh Jack you incredible son of a bitch.

"Dave," Cain said in a slow voice, as if speaking to a child. "What're you doing here? I get a call that someone's tearin' up Harry's place, I expect it to be Logan, or maybe one of the kids on a fake ID. The hell's goin' on?"

"Oh, I don't know," Jim said thickly, rubbing his head, "maybe two kids are in the infirmary, another one's in the hospital and Charles is still working out why." His voice crept back to Jack's acid drawl. "Maybe he spent the day fielding questions he can't answer even though he hasn't been on staff for two months. Maybe he was on the phone for an hour and a half with Dr. Moira, who's completely shitting it because she heard one of her patients went psychotic and she's stuck on that rock in the middle of nowhere with a medical emergency. Maybe it's even because on top of all that crap in his little Jewy heart David knows it's Rosh Hashanah and he's still pining like a pussy over that supermodel he so deeply deeply wronged with his psychotic break. Who knows? If you were Haller wouldn't you look for any excuse not to be you?"

Cain gritted his teeth, taking a long drink of his beer and slamming the empty pitcher on the table. "Cut the bullshit. Everyone else might buy into that whole multiple personalities thing. You know what I think? I think David's a fucked-up kid who can't cope with shit, so he makes up other people to cope for him. But when it comes down to it, he's got to deal with the consequences. So I'm gonna say this one more time, I want to talk to David Haller, and.... wait, supermodel?"

"Yeah, and a goddamn mindreader no less. Fuck if I know how he pulled that one off. Have to wonder what that says about her. She picked up the economy-pack. Women and children included. Guess money and breeding don't buy you standards. Not that the kid made an effort to point that out. Anything to keep those fantastic legs wrapped around his waist, huh?" Jack reached for a half-empty mug and gave Cain a nasty smile. "Bullshit is right. 'Highly creative survival mechanism' -- highly creative way to put your tail between your legs and fuck off. Like now. Little shit's doing it again."

Cain reached out and put two fingers on the mug before it reached Haller's mouth, squeezing gentle and shattering the glass, dumping cold beer over his friend's shirt. "Then the little shit is going to STOP doing it, or I'm going to beat the holy hell out of ALL of you until I get someone to talk to. So whoever you're pretending to be right now, Dave, knock it the fuck off and talk to me, or so help me god I'll drag you by the throat all the way to one of those little padded rooms and throw away the goddamn key!"

With his other hand, Cain reached around and grasped Haller's shoulder, shaking him hard enough to get his point across. "You have got people who are depending on you, and you do not have the luxury of playing make-believe and wishing the world better. You are going to learn to fucking cope. Now, I want to talk to David Haller."

It wasn't so much the motion as the tone that finally penetrated the haze of dissociation and alcohol, and Jim finally pushed his way to the fore. He blinked, mismatched gaze tracking down to Cain's hand, then up again into angry green eyes.

"You are," the younger man said quietly. "You always are."

Massive hand still resting on his shoulder, Jim sat back and took a deep breath, centering himself -- on his hands on his knees, on the chair against his back, on the cold stain of beer soaking through his shirt. "I'm sorry," Jim continued. "It's hard. To unlearn what works. To go against the easy route. And you're right. There's nothing easier than a padded room, except maybe the barrel of a gun."

"Well, we ain't all got that option," Cain said sharply, "so we make do. I don't know what all you've got up there in that head of yours, but it ain't nothing people here ain't been through. You hidin' behind this illness ain't fixing shit. So what's this then?" He indicated the bar around them. "Bad day? You've had worse. Talk to me, Dave."

Jim regarded the other man levelly. "Did I say the way I am was any excuse?" he asked, the mild, faintly dry tone and politely cocked eyebrow eerily familiar. The younger man shook his head. "It's nothing in particular. Just the confluence of events. This thing with Jennie and Marius . . . it's horrible, and frustrating. Especially for the kids. Two missing classmates are back and in bad shape and no one will give them any answers. Can't. Confidentiality thing. It's not too bad yet, but . . ." But neither one was consicous yet. A distracted hand wiped across the front of his shirt, more to remind himself he was still in the physical world than in any expectation of cleaning off the beer. God dammit, Jack. Jim sighed. "I wish there was something we could do."

Cain leaned back, refilling the pitcher. At least Haller was talking like himself again. "What, like take their minds off it? Ain't like we can just bust out a field trip to get everyone out of the house for a day or two. Probably couldn't get half these kids further than the backyard."

Jim snorted. "Uh, no. The last time both of us chaperoned together someone went evil. I don't want to go further than the backyard." He moved to wipe his hand on his jeans, then paused. Oh, no. He had a sinking suspicion that this was one of those 'everything looks good when you've been drinking' moments, but just voicing it couldn't hurt, right? "Um . . . although I think I just had a really bad idea."

"Well, since most of your 'good ideas' tend to suck," Cain said between swallows of beer, "let's hear the bad one."

Man's got you pegged, came the thought from Jack, which the telepath summarily ignored. "Well," Jim said slowly, raising one hand to rub at the back of his head, "you know how to pitch a tent, right?"