mm_chanter | Kortrijk, Vlaanderen, post Sharpe's return from the bar with DJ

the lights in the farmhouse are at a relative low; less than friendly eyes may still be on the place from the outside and besides, night's coming on. the main room - it might've been a proper living room at some point, but it's full of mismatched chairs, at least one table, a battered radio and its share of spare assorted equipment now - is far from empty of people. Some cluster together in threes and fours, some sit alone, quite a few are in and out as errands demand. Conversations are as low as the lighting, but just as present.

"{day wasn't a total loss,}" one man says from his position in a chair backed against a wall - it's the taller, heavier one who'd taken it upon himself to search Sharpe for weapons. The square-jawed woman turns away from a paper-scattered length of tabletop long enough to roll her eyes at him in what looks like exasperation rather than disagreement, but doesn't comment in words.

"{Room wherever,}" says the medic's younger brother, gesturing with one arm at the haphazard seating. "{for now. Anybody tries to get a debrief together and it's off, though. Not sure how much sense that makes, but that's how it tends to go.}"

Seba doesn't know Sharpe's history, after all. that's a fair assumption not to make.

Current Location: Kortrijk
Current Music: low-volume radio static

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

and_far_away

"You want me out of the room during debrief", he says without demur, "that's all right."

From:

mm_chanter

"{Might do,}" Seba agrees, equally unblushingly. "{that one's not up to me, at least not alone. It's fair enough that we don't hardly know you yet, and considering--well. No offense.}"

On the one hand, Sharpe didn't hurt Makosa when given the chance; just the opposite. On the other, new quantity who got past the sentries bang in the middle of an operation. and like Seba said, it isn't solely his call.

The younger man drops into a chair of his own, his back to the nearest wall. There are two or three free ones in the close vicinity, though one is admittedly not a chair so much as--oh, so that's where that wooden crate went. Whatever works.

From:

and_far_away

"It's what I'd do", he agrees, taking a seat. "Can't expect you to trust me right from the off."

From:

mm_chanter

Seba's gaze has gone assessing again. "{You've got sense,}" he says, and if he sounds as if he's choosing his words a bit more carefully than earlier, it's probably because he is. "{Even with all this on, not everybody'd say that sort of thing right off.}"

Out and out asking for someone's origin story is a good way to give too much of your own information away in a gigantic hurry. There are questions in Seba's face that he isn't voicing.

From:

and_far_away

"I've been a soldier", Sharpe allows. "When I was young."

From:

mm_chanter

"{Oh yeah?}" If that's interested, it's also a little wary, and well it should be, given the circumstances. All of them. "{Where? Not here, I'd guess?}"

From:

and_far_away

"{Not here}", he confirms. "{And not for your enemies, I promise you.}"

From:

mm_chanter

"{You must not have settled around here too long ago,}" Seba muses. The emphasis is on 'not, and his eyes are still keenly on Sharpe. Yes, he caught the word your, there. "{Were you like DJ and Andy or something? couldn't take watching from the roadside while all this went on? Not that it isn't appreciated, if you were, so long as our enemies are yours, too.}"

those last few words... need saying. Can't be too careful.

From:

and_far_away

"I'd had my fill of fighting." Yes, that's past tense. "Was trying to keep out of it, live in peace... but then things changed."

From:

mm_chanter

That gets a slight but visible nod. It's approving. So is the small smile that accompanies it, even if that smile is tinged with something very like ruefulness. "{Curse that pestering conscience, eh?}"

A beat, and then the darker man offers a hand. "{World needs a few more like you. It'd save a lot of heartache. Call me Seba. Sebastian, but because everybody in Europe apparently picks between the same ten names--}" a smirk "{--there's two of us.}"

Across the room, the radio static distorts briefly into words, then fades out again.

From:

and_far_away

Sharpe grins back and shakes hands, with a fleeting glance at the radio.

"{Richard. Nice to meet you, Seba - the other Sebastian was here first, eh?}"

From:

mm_chanter

"{Believe it or not,]" Seba says, thoroughly ignoring the radio for the moment, "{he was. For the variation on my name, blame my dear older brother, wherever he's gone. Him and a few of the others. By the time they dragged me in, the obvious nickname was already taken, and--oh well. Not that I mind it.}"

For a man who was ostensibly dragged into things, Seba sounds remarkably unbothered.

There's another second or so of voice communication on that radio, fainter this time, then it too is gone. From the sound of it, the set's tuned in on comms traffic, though whether friendly or hostile, it's hard to say.

From:

and_far_away

"Older brothers are good at that", he agrees. "Nicknaming and dragging you into things."

From:

mm_chanter

"{That's the truth,}" Seba chuckles. "{Don't ever ask him about the nickname I gave *him* when we were kids. 'S what I get for being too young to properly say a thing. Oh hey, speaking of trouble--oy! Sylvain, c'mere before I start telling stories about you to the new arrival.}"

the medic's just emerged from the passage to the makeshift infirmary. He obligingly detours in his brother and Sharpe's direction, though he's looking somewhere between amused and slightly uncertain. "{Should I be worried?}"

From:

and_far_away

"{Depends what the stories are", Sharpe says easily. "Or what Seba might decide to make up.}"

From:

mm_chanter

"{Oh lord,}" Sylvain chuckles, dropping into a chair on Sharpe's other side - it's not the wooden crate. the next person gets that one. "{I'm in trouble. Don't believe anything he says.}" The last is to Sharpe, a little to emphatically to be anything but a joke.

Seba's snickerfit subsides after a few seconds, and then he turns to his brother with a straight face. "{How're Dries and DJ? For that matter, how're the other two?}"

From:

and_far_away

Sharpe looks to Sylvain, waiting for that answer as well.

From:

mm_chanter

"{Makosa and Florian,}" Sylvain says, "{spark out, and I don't blame them. Florian's got every reason, and DJ--who wouldn't be? Jeroen's okay, though if anyone's seen the walking stick somebody said was in one of the closets, let me know? He'll be climbing the walls next. Dries...}" Here sylvain winces faintly. "{He's asleep, at least for the moment. He'll be fine, but I feel for him, believe me.}"

Seba winces too, hissing a breath out between his teeth. "{Ouch, yeah.}"

From:

and_far_away

"{At least he'll recover}", Sharpe says quietly. "{Even if he won't enjoy things much until he does.}"

From:

mm_chanter

"{Exactly,}" Sylvain agrees, and he's a little more emphatic about it than, say, a civilian unfamiliar with this sort of thing might be. "{We know it, and he knows it. But no, it won't be enjoyable for him for a while.}" There's empathy in the older brother's expression, fading to quiet seriousness as he turns to Sharpe.

"{And what about you?}" Sylvain starts, but Seba cuts across him. "{Already started some of that, brother mine. He's like Andy and DJ; couldn't stand on the roadside sort of thing. Soldier, he said.}"" Sylvain doesn't say anything in response, but his head tilts just slightly in a silent request for confirmation from Sharpe.

From:

and_far_away

Sharpe nods.

"{Once. I gave the army twenty-odd years, then I retired... until now. I've been living nice and quiet, growing apples.}"

From:

mm_chanter

"{A person can only stand so much,}" Sylvain says. It's part empathy, part agreement. Another man might make something black-humored out of the turn this conversation's taken; Seba's looking like he might go there. Sylvain doesn't.

"{None of us expected to be in a maquis at the start of all this either,}" the medic goes on. "{I came to Belgium to learn. But... seeing everything that started to happen, what else could we do? From the sound of things, you know what I mean.}"

It's not that he's making assumptions, really. It's that he's making perfectly reasonable ones. The trouble is, Sylvain can't know how much Sharpe doesn't know.

From:

and_far_away

Sharpe is quite capable of bluffing a conversation along when he has to.

"{I do}", he agrees. "{You were a student, then, before this?}"

From:

mm_chanter

What'd we say about Sylvain being more likely to trust than, say, An-Sophie? Well, it still holds. The medic doesn't bat an eye. "{I was,}" he agrees, "{and I'm not the only one. We're from all over, though.}"

"{You're not going to insist Brama and Lore came from the universities too?} Seba chuckles. Sylvain throws a look at his brother that's half grimace, half grin.

"{Only if I want to be flattened by one and eyerolled to death by the other,}" is his answer. "{Over there,}" he clarifies for Sharpe's benefit, nodding in the direction of the square-jawed woman, who's now in conversation with the older olive-skinned man from earlier. They're bent over the far end of the table, black and grey heads bowed.

Edited Date: 2014-03-24 12:44 am (UTC)