Confrontation in B Flat || Ben & Lev
leviathangeometry:
The first thing Jonathan did was get the attention of a server to ensure he absolutely had a free drink to make this impending situation a little easier on the nerves. Put bluntly, were the hunter to go on the attack, he didn’t like his odds, but he couldn’t help but feel protected by the several witnesses, despite their various levels of alcohol intoxication.
And then he led the way to the booth, slowing his long strides, if necessary. He wanted the hunter to be comfortable. Or at least feel like he wanted him to be.
Such a feeling. He contemplated the sentiment as he slid into one of the seats, keeping his body steady and relaxed, even though he could feel his muscles yearning to tighten, his body straining to fly, or fight. Unfortunately for the hunter’s conjecture, his reasons for being up on that stage amounted to pure narcissism, no more and no less. The perceived altruism was merely a beneficial after effect, given recent events. He could stand to capitalize on the grief by appearing to be generous or decent or caring. But the feeling the hunter referred to didn’t, strictly speaking, exist.
He didn’t miss the second layer of implication, but it was incorrect. The witches in this town were not his brethren, and he didn’t care about their lives, beyond the extent to which they might prove useful. Ultimately, they were disposable, and while any witch slain by a hunter was one less target for him, the scapegoat they brought with them was truly invaluable.
“I find it’s a give and take.” As it were, in music and in life, others gave and he took, like the unashamed vampiric creature he was. It was not an accident that blood was his discipline. He rested his hand on his chin, making shapes with his face that were vaguely sincere enough to suggest, perhaps he was being humble.
The conundrum was: how could he explain that he didn’t care at all? That, in fact, the entire act of caring about anyone but oneself was ultimately not only entirely pointless, but quintessentially self-destructive? A better question is, why should he say anything? To disclose the charade, reveal his ace after a gentle prodding was out of the question. He had reason to fear the hunter; handicapped though he may be, he proved himself capable. But he refused to let the fear turn him into a quibbling sack of meat. The hunter would have to try a little bit harder.
He shifted his gait in the seat to something nonchalant, his fingers idly tapping some rhythm on the table top. The only thing that betrayed the caveman in his mind tripping the alarm was the pitter patter of his heart, but if the hunter was looking to check his pulse, he wouldn’t be above hitting a cripple.
“I have to wonder if you were moved tonight as well.” They were speaking in code, and Jonathan wasn’t entirely sure he would understand it if it went any deeper than this. He didn’t work well with veiled threats and double entendres and hidden meanings lurking in the shadows. He didn’t like games when they weren’t his to win, when he didn’t write the rules. The one thing he needed to know was if he had reason to worry, although he still wasn’t convinced he was going to get an honest answer from someone potentially sizing him up for a body bag.
The first witch he killed had been as young as him -- maybe younger. Before he learned to play the game, his rage had settled into violence. He had no use for subtlety then. The witch’s death had been tragic -- or so the community had said. It had been a show of needless violence. He remembered he got a call from his mentor who took him out for celebratory dinner after it made national headlines. That had always been the world he lived in. The kind of world where power was power and anything less was a death sentence.
Of course, not all hunters thought that way. There were plenty of packs who would have seen Birchwood and fled to the hills -- but not the MacKenzies. Not Ben. His mother might have told him to raze Birchwood to the ground, but Ben was not his mother. He saw value in magick, he saw danger in men. After all, if magick was so vile, he might have condemned himself -- despite the Order’s claims that reflection was divine providence, not magick.
The question was not: how should I kill the man before me? It was: should I kill the man before me?
The answer wasn’t quite clear yet.
In either case, Ben studied the way the man’s shoulders moved, the way he shifted his weight. He watched him like a predator. He didn’t seem weak.
“I wasn’t,” he took a sip of his drink and wiped the foam from his mustache. “But I think then, you might be able to imagine why. I cannae help but wonder why I have nae seen more of the leaders of yer nae so wee community. You can imagine that, as the town’s professional on such matters -- what being a professor of such things and all -- someone might come knocking. What de y’think?”