He sobers quickly from the residual thrill of a little easy, petty magic, like conversation, when that conversation turns voiced and suddenly very significant.
"Yeah. It was after." No denying that. The intent had been - off. Scrambled. But. "I didn't lie. This place can't keep me. I didn't know how we'd be getting out then and I don't know now, but my universe will have me back, one way or another. And I won't go until the way's clear."
John's expression at that is familiar; it's the same look he gave Stephen a lot while the wizard was living at his house. He has to hide it in his glass a moment before responding. "I'd like to go home," he admits. "I also, and don't mention this to Ianthe, think it's very likely I no longer have a home to go to. My presence was the only thing preventing Dominicus from collapsing into a neutron star."
His breath catches, somewhere between the look and the admission. Brow pinched, it takes him a second to catch up with that, to align it with what he knows and what he doesn't, make sense of the scale of it.
Then his thoughts kick into gear again. He leans forward, elbows rooted on his thighs, careful to be firm as well as gentle when he speaks. He's not looking to offer baseless platitudes. What he says carries the weight of experience.
"There's nothing to say time's operating at mutual value between here and there. We're experiencing it now, but only because we know it, recognise it, understand its passage and the markers we use to keep it - which are operating more or less exactly as they might on Earth, give or take the occasional freak weather anomaly, which is nice for us and anyone from a similar experience given how many planets there are with sentient life and how many different relationships to how many stars. There wasn't a jungle until she generously presented us with one. Now Quentin's on the way to reinventing chocolate."
Which is to say, in a roundabout way that needs clarifying to be beyond doubt: "The Void itself seems to be timeless. And we awoke here by unknown means, held at its apparent centre, surrounded. Just because time seems to move here doesn't mean it moves everywhere. Just because you're here doesn't mean you're not there."
That's both some insane physics and also not totally outside John's grasp; he itches to go home and draw up some calculations on House's blackboard, though.
"Interesting," he says, though what's interesting isn't strictly this lesson in time dilation or further entrenchment of his theory that they're beyond the River, where time and space become meaningless. No, the interesting thing here, John smiling a little into a sip of his glass, is this:
"You're an optimist."
A beat for that accusation to settle.
"You are, though. I just told you that the nine planets of my Empire and their millions of residents are likely crisped and your response is, hang on, let's not be hasty, they might just be frozen in time until your return." He's charmed.
Stephen's expression holds for a beat on grave. Then, helplessly, shifts into mild bemusement. In spite of the drip feed of little parts of a whole that's growing more expansive every time he does his level best not to think too hard about it, there's a smile on his face that he has to tug - forcibly and with little success - into some approximation of a frown.
"I've held time in a stone around my neck. I'd argue I'm a realist."
His reality just looks a little different from most people's, that's all.
"Nup, sorry mate. The realist train of thought goes, sure we're getting out of this prison, but like they say about war and peace, you never really go home again." Light, despite what he's saying. "The realist says, John, you brought them all back once, just do it again with a bit less Imperialism this time."
He's the realist, you see. He knocks his foot against Stephen's companionably, holds out his empty glass.
Another smattering of things he half knew and doesn't wish to linger on here and now when they're sitting sipping wine in the shell of his woodland getaway.
"Well this realist went to another dimension and came back almost before he left after being there for an untold but technically boundless amount of non-time." He takes a swig of his own wine, glowering playfully over the rim of his glass at John even as he wafts a finger to activate a refill for him. "So."
So! There.
Which is a bit of a weak final point, so he'll offer a follow up.
"All right, all right," John laughs, even if he's always a little temped to just keep saying horrific things to Stephen until he does something about them. Taking their stupid little discussions to a real location instead of just their heads hasn't changed that any. "I won't dwell on it, at least. I won't find out until we leave, and that's still important to me." Not the least because he wants his resurrection abilities back so he can keep those he lives close without having to play Zlatka's game.
"It does beg the question, do you think the marks would carry with us? Everyone heads home but we're all still in each other's heads."
There's a - brief freeze on that question, glass halfway lifted for another sip, where he stares very directly at John. Like he's trying to work out if he understands what he's just asked.
"I think we might have to fix that part before we go."
Relatively light, because he's not thinking about the voices, the potential of carrying them all back home with him across the bounds of universes, what that might be like - or what it would be like to lose it. He's thinking instead about the mark itself. The other reality of life here that it dictates.
John understands, he's just picked the optimistic focus of what those marks mean.
"All right," he puts forward slowly, almost tentative, "But it would be easier to deal with back home, wouldn't it? Medical technology, research theorems. Grindr, for those of us still enduring the age of the internet." Or Tindr, whatever. "And you could just pop in and visit, you know. Jim, or whoever." Kovacs. Maybe Wanda. Not that he speculates to himself about Stephen's sex life or anything.
Easier than in a place where sex is practically a form of worship, and there's a festival every other week to make a spectacle of all the wonderful, terrible things human (and other) beings can do to one another.
Forgive him if he looks skeptical. He's a sorcerer with a public profile that spans the Earth, and a willingness to date coworkers that sits in the negatives.
"Sure. It'd be nice to have some multiversal penpals."
Thinking about leaving in this context is enough to have him down half his glass in two short swigs, though he keeps his expression wry.
"Easier for people who hold a lot of shame about their desires." Not particularly pointed. John's fine either way: he was right in the middle of his slut era back home. But he feels like the environment of Rubikykskoye is somehow unconductive to true sexiness, too barefaced. Finding a partner isn't a problem, but the ease comes from making connections not fuelled by naked desperation.
The idea of restraint due to reputation hasn't even really occurred to him.
A raise of a brow, bemusement really truly kicking in here. "That's an interesting perspective."
The tone doesn't really convey whether he approves or disapproves, but interesting as a word sits somewhere in the same family as nice, and he's used both in the span of thirty seconds. It's certainly saying something.
"Do you want to guess the last time I seriously dated?"
John's brow lifts; he sips his wine. "Want to guess the last time I did, before Rubilykskoye?"
Still, he can't deny he's interested, leaning forward and resting a forearm on a lifted knee, glass dangling from his hand, somehow halfway empty already. There's a growing looseness to his limbs, in the long loll of his neck. "Let me guess. You had a passionate romance with a peer in college but found you couldn't build both a life and career together, and chose surgery over starting a family, and you've never moved on from that."
Alright, immortal Sir Nine-Planet. The look he sends back is a pointed do you want me to embarrass myself for your benefit or not? Then John hits the nail near enough to the head that he blinks the expression clean off his face. When the dust settles, there's a lopsided grin tugging lazy at one corner of his mouth.
"Close. Official word is she couldn't love me because, and I quote, I always had to be the one holding the knife. Which I learned at her wedding about a month before absconding on my winter retreat."
Also known as his multiversal abduction to the world they now find themselves in. He won't be lingering there, because John landing close enough to the bullseye makes it easy to move swiftly on to the rest of his point. Echoing John's forward lean, a finger ticks up to mark off each item on his list.
"Meanwhile, here, I have two pseudo-spouses, one man who lives periodically in my room, a seemingly ever-growing collection of people with whom I am intimately familiar, and a family of fellow cult survivors. I've been here less than six months. In the hypothetical world where I take this," he taps at the Niez symbol on the back of his hand, "home with me, the only reason it would be easier is because I can't go a month without a near death experience."
"When everyone's living on top of each other and under a ton of pressure, you form relationships that feel more important than any others you've ever had," John says. "And then you finish your placement or your PHD and they simply don't stand up in the real world." It's something he's seen again and again and again. In college, during the Apocalypse, in the Empire, even here.
He's aware that's terribly pessemistic, to imply that the connections Stephen's formed — that they've both formed — probably wouldn't hold up in more functional, ordinary circumstances.
"You could find it again back home, just gather a few people into a high-pressure situation. Maybe a militant uprising, a border dispute, or whatever the multiversal equivalent is."
A breathed laugh as John lays down a psychology lesson that only helps to confirm his point - the connections he's tumbled into in this place aren't anything he could or would try to replicate in his own life. Circumstances have made of him two distinct and separate people. The mark, if he has any say in it, will not be coming home with him.
But they're talking in maybes. He doesn't need to flog the point.
John splays out his hand, looking at the mark on his hand. "No," he says. He's taking his people with him; he won't need the telepathy. "But I've cut my hand off enough to know that doesn't work to remove them. Necromancy doesn't effect them. And I don't think the Duchess knows much more than us."
It's wry, flippant, punctuated with a sip. They have enough to contend with in the short term that the mark seems like a far off problem, something he's accepted will only be worked out along the way or after the fact, when the mysteries surrounding their being here are laid bare enough to show the inner workings of the rest.
"If it's inherent to the world, or to the Void, the absence of either might do the trick. We're missing some pieces. We'll just have to wait until we find them."
Maybe it's because he's had enough wine to be warmly tipsy, but John finds that both comforting and satisfactory, is willing to let it cap off the discussion and set his mind at ease for now. They need more pieces, that's all. Those will come in time. He has time - he has so much fucking time.
John shifts his crossed legs, changes the hand his wine glass is in. "I should go," he sighs, glancing reluctantly to the swirling portal. Before he says or does something stupid and ruins what has turned into quite a nice little time together. "But you're not allowed to fucking, ignore me anymore, all right?"
"Yeah. Alright." It earns a little tweak of a smile. Gaze drops to the swill of wine around his glass.
"Thanks for missing me." In spite of - well, everything. If he doesn't look up, it could just be tongue in cheek, a tease. It isn't, quite. "And for coming over."
He's missed him, too. Missed the strangely easy habit of reaching out that had been growing even before it became his daily lived reality. Stephen pushes himself to his feet then, reaching a hand out to accept John's glass when he's ready to surrender it, helping to smooth the transition of his exit.
John stands, returns the glass, and that should be that. Back to the lakeshore and then home, unless Stephen's portal drops him off directly. Except—
"It's not a bad thing, to always be the one holding the knife," he says, paused in the liminal space of leaving. Stephen surely knows by now that he's a control freak desperately looking for an excuse to give up control. But it's just a parting comment, and then it's his turn to be a bit of a coward and go.
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"Yeah. It was after." No denying that. The intent had been - off. Scrambled. But. "I didn't lie. This place can't keep me. I didn't know how we'd be getting out then and I don't know now, but my universe will have me back, one way or another. And I won't go until the way's clear."
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Then his thoughts kick into gear again. He leans forward, elbows rooted on his thighs, careful to be firm as well as gentle when he speaks. He's not looking to offer baseless platitudes. What he says carries the weight of experience.
"There's nothing to say time's operating at mutual value between here and there. We're experiencing it now, but only because we know it, recognise it, understand its passage and the markers we use to keep it - which are operating more or less exactly as they might on Earth, give or take the occasional freak weather anomaly, which is nice for us and anyone from a similar experience given how many planets there are with sentient life and how many different relationships to how many stars. There wasn't a jungle until she generously presented us with one. Now Quentin's on the way to reinventing chocolate."
Which is to say, in a roundabout way that needs clarifying to be beyond doubt: "The Void itself seems to be timeless. And we awoke here by unknown means, held at its apparent centre, surrounded. Just because time seems to move here doesn't mean it moves everywhere. Just because you're here doesn't mean you're not there."
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"Interesting," he says, though what's interesting isn't strictly this lesson in time dilation or further entrenchment of his theory that they're beyond the River, where time and space become meaningless. No, the interesting thing here, John smiling a little into a sip of his glass, is this:
"You're an optimist."
A beat for that accusation to settle.
"You are, though. I just told you that the nine planets of my Empire and their millions of residents are likely crisped and your response is, hang on, let's not be hasty, they might just be frozen in time until your return." He's charmed.
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Stephen's expression holds for a beat on grave. Then, helplessly, shifts into mild bemusement. In spite of the drip feed of little parts of a whole that's growing more expansive every time he does his level best not to think too hard about it, there's a smile on his face that he has to tug - forcibly and with little success - into some approximation of a frown.
"I've held time in a stone around my neck. I'd argue I'm a realist."
His reality just looks a little different from most people's, that's all.
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He's the realist, you see. He knocks his foot against Stephen's companionably, holds out his empty glass.
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"Well this realist went to another dimension and came back almost before he left after being there for an untold but technically boundless amount of non-time." He takes a swig of his own wine, glowering playfully over the rim of his glass at John even as he wafts a finger to activate a refill for him. "So."
So! There.
Which is a bit of a weak final point, so he'll offer a follow up.
"No need to be so pessimistic."
Yes. Powerful play.
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"It does beg the question, do you think the marks would carry with us? Everyone heads home but we're all still in each other's heads."
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"I think we might have to fix that part before we go."
Relatively light, because he's not thinking about the voices, the potential of carrying them all back home with him across the bounds of universes, what that might be like - or what it would be like to lose it. He's thinking instead about the mark itself. The other reality of life here that it dictates.
Optimism, it seems, can only stretch so far.
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"All right," he puts forward slowly, almost tentative, "But it would be easier to deal with back home, wouldn't it? Medical technology, research theorems. Grindr, for those of us still enduring the age of the internet." Or Tindr, whatever. "And you could just pop in and visit, you know. Jim, or whoever." Kovacs. Maybe Wanda. Not that he speculates to himself about Stephen's sex life or anything.
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Easier than in a place where sex is practically a form of worship, and there's a festival every other week to make a spectacle of all the wonderful, terrible things human (and other) beings can do to one another.
Forgive him if he looks skeptical. He's a sorcerer with a public profile that spans the Earth, and a willingness to date coworkers that sits in the negatives.
"Sure. It'd be nice to have some multiversal penpals."
Thinking about leaving in this context is enough to have him down half his glass in two short swigs, though he keeps his expression wry.
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The idea of restraint due to reputation hasn't even really occurred to him.
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The tone doesn't really convey whether he approves or disapproves, but interesting as a word sits somewhere in the same family as nice, and he's used both in the span of thirty seconds. It's certainly saying something.
"Do you want to guess the last time I seriously dated?"
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Still, he can't deny he's interested, leaning forward and resting a forearm on a lifted knee, glass dangling from his hand, somehow halfway empty already. There's a growing looseness to his limbs, in the long loll of his neck. "Let me guess. You had a passionate romance with a peer in college but found you couldn't build both a life and career together, and chose surgery over starting a family, and you've never moved on from that."
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"Close. Official word is she couldn't love me because, and I quote, I always had to be the one holding the knife. Which I learned at her wedding about a month before absconding on my winter retreat."
Also known as his multiversal abduction to the world they now find themselves in. He won't be lingering there, because John landing close enough to the bullseye makes it easy to move swiftly on to the rest of his point. Echoing John's forward lean, a finger ticks up to mark off each item on his list.
"Meanwhile, here, I have two pseudo-spouses, one man who lives periodically in my room, a seemingly ever-growing collection of people with whom I am intimately familiar, and a family of fellow cult survivors. I've been here less than six months. In the hypothetical world where I take this," he taps at the Niez symbol on the back of his hand, "home with me, the only reason it would be easier is because I can't go a month without a near death experience."
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He's aware that's terribly pessemistic, to imply that the connections Stephen's formed — that they've both formed — probably wouldn't hold up in more functional, ordinary circumstances.
"You could find it again back home, just gather a few people into a high-pressure situation. Maybe a militant uprising, a border dispute, or whatever the multiversal equivalent is."
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But they're talking in maybes. He doesn't need to flog the point.
"I take it you're hoping to keep yours."
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It's wry, flippant, punctuated with a sip. They have enough to contend with in the short term that the mark seems like a far off problem, something he's accepted will only be worked out along the way or after the fact, when the mysteries surrounding their being here are laid bare enough to show the inner workings of the rest.
"If it's inherent to the world, or to the Void, the absence of either might do the trick. We're missing some pieces. We'll just have to wait until we find them."
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John shifts his crossed legs, changes the hand his wine glass is in. "I should go," he sighs, glancing reluctantly to the swirling portal. Before he says or does something stupid and ruins what has turned into quite a nice little time together. "But you're not allowed to fucking, ignore me anymore, all right?"
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"Thanks for missing me." In spite of - well, everything. If he doesn't look up, it could just be tongue in cheek, a tease. It isn't, quite. "And for coming over."
He's missed him, too. Missed the strangely easy habit of reaching out that had been growing even before it became his daily lived reality. Stephen pushes himself to his feet then, reaching a hand out to accept John's glass when he's ready to surrender it, helping to smooth the transition of his exit.
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"It's not a bad thing, to always be the one holding the knife," he says, paused in the liminal space of leaving. Stephen surely knows by now that he's a control freak desperately looking for an excuse to give up control. But it's just a parting comment, and then it's his turn to be a bit of a coward and go.