theshatterdome | aint no grave can hold my body down

He's a chaser, a wall-rat - a slur whispered in disgust and curiosity combined, mumbled under breath as he passes, by people either unaffected by the war (not that there are many) or those that view it as a waste of time, money, and resources.

Raleigh knows that. He doesn't argue the point, either. He's well aware that there's nothing near as efficient as the Jaegers, but that's another life, another time.

This is what he does now.

Raleigh wakes up, he washes his face, dons a sweater and trousers and leaves, making for the wall so he can work to eat and conversely, eat to work. He exists - he doesn't live.

It's been like this for a few years.

He's been watching the jaeger program fall further into disarray, watching people he knew - people he was friends with, respected, laughed and joked with - fall in battle.

Romeo Blue's fall hit the hardest though, he knew the Gage twins well and when he heard Romeo fell a year or so after Knifehead, he mourned.

And then he moved on. What else do you do?

He spends the vast majority of his time alone and when he decides to partake in company, it's usually questionable at best.

Tonight he's sitting in some local bar, hunched over an untouched glass of Daniels, eyes trained on whatever football game is on.

...It's football season, he vaguely realizes. Pretty good ways into it, he's seeing.

Huh.

Means it's his birthday soon.

Raleigh takes the shot in his hand, then signals to the bartender for another.

The Kaiju war is...fascinating -- to Roy, at least. He's been following it since the first attack, though the hype of the Kaiju/Jaeger worship always managed to escape him. He understood that it was nothing to take lightly, and so all the propaganda, the costumes, the toys...fuck, if he didn't think it was ridiculous.

He, of course, has always been much more enraptured by the Jaegers; the tech fasinates him, just like all things mechanical, and he just wishes he could get a closer look, get his hands on more details, but he's accepted that it's not exactly in the cards for him, not with his other work.

Now, bars aren't usually his scene -- not with his little "problem" -- but he still doesn't mind hanging around with friends as a designated driver or just general company. He's at least gotten to the point that being around alcohol isn't painfully tempting, and he can easy settle for a glass of soda -- and some flirting with the bartender.

He chats with his friends, laughs with them, just sipping at his carbonated drink as he catches sight of the blond man at the end of the bar.

Oh.

Wow.

Roy pauses mid-sip to watch Raleigh, setting his glass back down to really get a good look at him. He's...well, Roy thinks he's nothing short of gorgeous, if a little reclusive, apparently. The way he's curled over his glass doesn't exactly scream that he's looking for company, but Roy can't really help himself.

He slips away from his group of (not exactly close) friends, taking his soda with him as he plops himself down in the seat next to Raleigh.

"So, who's winning?"

Once a jaeger pilot, always a jaeger pilot. Raleigh lives life half in a haze and half on a hair trigger, his senses kicking into overdrive every night at two thirty am (yancy! yancy!) the moment his brother was ripped out of his head on repeat--

Raleigh, listen to me!

Pain, excruciating, always follows, the black, hollow and empty part of his brain that was once occupied by Yancy shrieking at him, neural connections still going haywire and searching for a consciousness that is no longer there, no longer responding. The fuses short out and sometimes, Raleigh blanks out and sometimes he lays awake in bed, head screaming in agony, lips pressed so tightly together they turn white.

Every night he dreams of Yancy -- hears him, sees sometimes too, just there in the corner of his vision, just out of focus. He just shakes his head and sighs, says I'm sorry, kid then vanishes and Raleigh's left wondering just how fucking crazy he really is.

"Packers."

The kid draws him out of his thoughts and Raleigh gestures with his empty glass at the TV, brow furrowed.

"Looks like they're kicking ass."

Edited 2014-03-06 01:56 (UTC)

Roy sips at his soda as he looks from the television and back to Raleigh.

"Not exactly your team, I'm guessing?" he asks with a chuckle, setting down his drink and glancing at the bartender as he comes back to refill Raleigh's whiskey.

"Put his on me."

Of course he's going to pay for Raleigh's drink -- unless Raleigh wants him to fuck off, but even then, he'll still probably cover the shot, because why not?

He's a nice guy sometimes.

(And while the bartender's at it, he'll take another refill on his Coke.)

The guy hasn't left.

Raleigh figured he'd gotten up to check the score -- and Raleigh had noticed the second he moved, pilot reflexes -- but now he was getting comfortable and buying him a drink.

Raleigh blinks at him, and answers slowly, voice layered with confusion.

"...I'm more of a Steelers fan myself. And you don't...have to do that."

He's not really looking his best - he's a little hardened and he feels like he's eighty. He's got a shadow going on, and a smudge or two on his cheek from working on the wall that day.

This young, attractive, clean guy cannot possibly be hitting on someone like Raleigh.

Can he?

"Trust me, I'm doin' it because I want to," he assures Raleigh easily, giving him a wink.

...okay, maybe he's not the smoothest guy in the universe, but he likes to think he's at least charming enough.

"So, Steelers guy, huh? Is that 'cause you're from Pittsburgh or you just like the team?" He sips at his soda when the bartender fills his glass and Raleigh's, and Roy seems pretty content to get comfortable where he's sitting next to the blond.

And, since Raleigh hasn't told him to piss off yet, Roy's going to take that as a (semi) good sign.

Raleigh is going to have to pick his jaw up off the floor at some point, isn't he.

"I like the team." He pulls his glass back over when it's refilled, still staring at the brown liquid in astonishment before glancing back over at his new companion. He's not really in the mood for conversation - he never is - but he's also not had a lot of opportunity for it. It isn't like Raleigh's been seeking people out to chat up.

"You know how it goes...home state doesn't have one, so you just...pick something."

Damn, those eyes. Raleigh may be a bit scruffy, and he looks like he's been working all day from the smudges on his face, but those eyes are phenomenal.

"Makes plenty of sense," he decides simply with that easy, slightly-dorky grin of his. "So you're from around here, then?"

He wants to flirt with this guy, get to know him at least a little better, and maaaaybe, if he's lucky, get his number (or better yet, take him home for the night).

They're also confused, but -- you know.

Raleigh sips his drink this time instead of shooting it, wanting to savor it because he's actually not here to get completely plastered -- not this time, anyway. And besides, he's interested in this person that actually just...came up to a dirty construction worker and started talking to him and buying him a drink.

So he answers the question, sort of.

"Anchorage, originally. You?"

Roy nods, smiling at Raleigh around the lip of his glass. "Arizona, actually. So it definitely doesn't fall into the category of 'around here'." He just chuckles, actually kind of pleased to see Raleigh isn't just downing the shot -- not that Roy wouldn't mind buying him another if he did.

But really, he's more enthused by the fact that Raleigh is actually talking to him, because, well, you never know with guys. Some take less kindly to flirting from another man, so Roy usually has to watch himself a bit more there.

"I'm Roy, by the way," he adds as he offers his hand to Raleigh.

He glances at the offered hand and hesitates, mainly because he came straight here after work and hasn't taken a shower yet -- his hands are still smeared with ash and soot from welding, dirt still under his fingernails. He's hardly the picture of excellence, and at this point in Raleigh's life even on his good days he's still pretty scruffy.

He's pretty sure he smells like old pennies, oil and sweat and there is nothing good about any of that. He looks like a hobo so the guy probably isn't planning on robbing him -- what does he really want?

"Raleigh," he offers, though he's holding his hands up, palms facing Roy. "I'm a little dirty, man. You don't wanna shake this."

Roy's more than familiar with what it looks like when you work with your hands, especially when it comes to metal and even welding, so he's not exactly bothered by the smell or the way Raleigh looks.

Honestly, Roy would've been the same if he hadn't showered before showing up at the bar.

He glances down at Raleigh's hands, considering it for a second, then he still reaches out and gives that dirty hand a brief shake. Fuck if he cares what he gets smudged on his own hand; he's used to having oil smeared all over himself, and looking, well, grimy.

It comes with the kind of tech work he does. He's a pretty hands-on kind of guy.

"Nice to meet you, Raleigh," he says with a grin.

Roy keeps surprising him.

He grabs Raleigh's hand and shakes it anyway and what else can Raleigh do besides shake it back, grimy nails or not? He's calloused, too -- but not as bad as one would think. Most of his work requires thick, heavy gloves to protect his skin from the welding tools and the elements, so he's not in as bad of shape as he could be.

"It's nice to meet you too, Roy."

He flashes a brief smile, eyes that were previously fairly dull brightening just a little.

"You follow football?" He gestures with his glass.

Okay, the smile is definitely something Roy would like to see more of. It's small, but it's there, and the way it lights Raleigh's eyes is perfect.

He glances back at the tv screen when Raleigh points to it, then just shrugs, smiling as he sips at his soda.

"Sometimes. But I'm really more of a hockey guy, myself," he admits with a chuckle.

"Did you come here just to check out the game?"

"So'm I." Football is what's on, but when Raleigh actually watched sports, he preferred hockey.

"Well--"

Raleigh hesitates, because the reasons he came here are...not for pleasant conversation. It's easiest to just keep things simple, so he doesn't scare Roy off.

"Yeah. No reception in the barracks."

Roy raises an eyebrow at that, clearly intrigued.

"Barracks, huh?" He knows what that means, out here. And from the state of Raleigh's clothes and how messy he is, it seems pretty obvious.

"So I'm guessing you work on the wall, then?" And Roy doesn't seem the least bit bothered by that -- because he's not. He hears the way people mutter about wall workers, but he's never shared that opinion.

Albeit, he doesn't think the wall will do much good against a massive kaiju, but at least it's something.

"...Yeah."

Raleigh seems hesitant to answer, mainly because he knows the general mindset in regards to people who work on the wall.

He's been called a rat more often than not. It doesn't really bother him, not anymore.

But for some reason...he kind of cares what this guy thinks. Maybe it's because he's the first person to really try to talk to Raleigh in years, maybe it's because Raleigh likes those sharp green eyes.

Maybe it's because he was polite enough to buy Raleigh a drink.

Regardless, he doesn't know, but he's nodding anyway, because he's already told one white lie and Raleigh's never been very good at blatant lying anyway.

"Been doing it for a few years. Gotta eat somehow." He sounds a little bit defensive, like he's waiting for a snide remark.

The defensiveness fazes Roy just about as much as Raleigh admitting he works on the wall; Roy's not even slightly disgruntled by what Raleigh does for a living.

"I hear you there," he assures him, and that warm smile of his hasn't wavered in the slightest. "That's pretty hard work, though." If anything, he's impressed; he could never manage something like that -- thought that might also be because he'd be bored out of his skull after building something like the wall.

He needs something that gives him feedback, a real finished product that he can be proud of. It's definitely on a smaller scale than the wall, but the tech he designs is supposed to be like that.

Some of the tension eases in Raleigh's back, and he feels a little bit lighter -- relief is a hell of a thing.

Not that he's sure why he's so relieved, but.

"It can get pretty grueling."

He'll admit that much, at the very least.

"I bet." Roy smiles as he finishes his soda, and just asks the bartender for another one; he feels a little more at ease with something in his glass, even if it's just soda.

"Do you like it? I mean, that might be a stupid question, but you've been doing it for a while, so you must not totally hate it, right?" His expression is just as open and curious as it has been, and there's nothing to hide behind that warm smile.

He's asking because he wants to know, not because he's trying to get anything out of Raleigh -- well, aside from the guy's phone number.

Reporters could be pretty slick sometimes - there's not many Americans who don't know who Raleigh Becket is and even on the wall he gets looks. Raleigh doesn't think that this guy is a reporter, but these days it was hard to tell.

He stays vague with his answers, but he doesn't shun him - Raleigh's enjoying the company.

"It's hard work," he says, not really answering the question. "But it feeds me, gives me a place to sleep."

Roy's definitely not a reporter, but he couldn't blame Raleigh for suspecting he might be; he's sure more than a few people would want to probe him about losing his brother, piloting Gipsy Danger on his own, and what he's doing with himself now. Roy might be curious, but it's not something he's going to ask about.

"At least there's that," he says with an easy smile.

"I dunno if I could manage it. I mean, I pretty much work with my hands all day, but man, the height might just give me a heart attack." He laughs, warm and open, and while he may have plenty to hide, none of it is in regards to Raleigh.

"It's pretty high," Raleigh agrees, corners of his lips briefly tilting up. "I usually try for positions at the top. You get better rations, since it's so dangerous."

People die every day building a wall that isn't going to work. It's the most senseless thing in the world but Raleigh doesn't know what else to do with himself.

"What do you do?"

"Man, good on you. Color me impressed," he says with a soft chuckle.

"I work with electronics, mostly. Some robotics design," he admits, giving a shrug. And his fair share of weapons mechanics. That's his favorite.

"Really?"

That kind of has Raleigh's attention -- how can it not? He'd been part of that world for a long time.

"You in the PPDC?"

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