Questions and Concerns

Who: Dorian and The Mourning Star (NPC)
Where: Alexandria
When: immediately after this

Dorian watched the curious girl leave, head tilted to one side. That was just weird. Really weird. He had weird interactions with people, but nothing like that. “I know it’s a little ridiculous to think you’re that omniscient, but really that was just weird. If I were Star I might be, well curious.” He was talking to himself and he realized that was a touch crazy. At least it was crazy until Star showed up. If she showed up.

And show up she did. It was like she always did, wholly unobtrusive. One second she wasn't there, the next she was, without any show of lights or anything else. "Shouldn't your definition of 'weird' have severely shifted towards the utterly insane by now?" she asked, amused.

For once he didn’t jump when she just appeared, instead it got somewhat of a smile out of him. Maybe it was the relief of not talking to himself or just that Star had that sort of presence. “Probably so, but I’ve always had issues with perspective.” He nodded towards the space that the blond had occupied. “Did you get any of that or do you want a play by play?”

Star smirked at him, crossing her arms over her chest. "Why don't you give me your version of events." she suggested, wanting to see how he'd frame it. What his perspective was, as it were.

“You seem to have someone with a curious level of interest in you and the Fallen or whatever the collective of them are called. I’ve had people ask but not like that. And she was hiding something.” That much was blatantly obvious in the way she’d talked around things. “And I’ve never seen someone go that defensive on me. She looked ready for me to jump across the counter and eat her.” Which was what really had set him off. Odd questions he was used to but odd questions mixed with someone being completely on guard made him wonder. “Did I miss something or did I grow horns?”

"Fallen is correct, when referring to the angelic, Ascended for the demonic." she told him, nodding as he spoke. "She could very well have expected you to eat her because you read as demonic, remember?" she suggested to him. "When someone's asking you too slanted questions about Fallen angels..." she trailed off so he could do the mental math.

Dorian nodded, having had the terms right in his head, but glad for the confirmation. “I read...ahh. I’ve had little interactions with angels.” Which was the case when raise by a demon. He leaned on the counter a little staring off for a moment. “She must have thought I was nuts then, being all calm and cool about a face to face with an angel.” He tried not to smile about it but it was kind of amusing. “You worried about all the questions? She’s looking for answers. Or you. Or both.”

"Perhaps she thinks you're just that badass now. Or wildly unintelligent, one of the two." Star told him, winking. She reached out to ruffle his hair lightly. "We should see about cute little baby horns for you. It'd be great." she added, teasing. After, she shrugged. "I'm never worried about questions. If she wants to talk to me, maybe she'll call at some point."

Dorian made a face when she ruffled his hair but wound up smiling. “I don’t need horns. Unless I am that just painfully good looking that we have tip the scales.” It was a joke he never would have made before, but now it was just fun. “Let’s hope for badass and not the unintelligent. I don’t fit the badass bill, but I’d really hate for her to think I’m stupid.” He watched Star for a moment. “Do you think she’ll call? Or figure out she just...can?”

"You are pretty painfully good looking." Star confided in him, smiling. Then she moved forward. "And a lot of people don't look like they fit the badass bill, but they are. Take your little brother, for instance. Underestimating someone is the dumb move. So, hopefully you're being overestimated. As for if I think she'll call...yes, I think she'll get around to it."

Dorian grinned at the compliment, nodding a little. She had a point about underestimating people but it was hard for him to think of Caleb not fitting the badass bill. Maybe he’d just gotten too damn used to what Caleb could do and saw that rather than what other people saw. She was right though, how many people underestimated someone like Kayos when she was tougher than Hunt? “I think she overestimated me. She knew exactly what stance to put her body in to be prepared. She was smart enough to be cautious, that’s more than most.” He was curious what the angel had wanted though. If she was Fallen herself, she would know Star. “Or she won’t have to, you’ll come on your own accord if she does fall right?” Dorian looked at Star, curious about that. He rarely got to actually ask her questions from his scholarly point of view.

"Of course. If she falls, then I'll be right there to hold her hand." Star said, since that was what she did. Whether people wanted her to or not, that was part of her main purpose. "Granted I will also take her wings and such, but the process is traumatic enough without my being a bitch about things. I always try to be as supportive as they'll let me."

Dorian could guess how it was traumatic. He’d only had his for a month or so at best and the thought of losing them left him feeling off balance. “I always assumed as much from you,” he told her about being supportive. “What do they do after, if I can ask. I’m going to guess my mother wasn’t exactly a shining example of how to behave.”

Leaning against the counter next to Dorian, she smiled a little. "What they do is up to them, really. How to behave is purely subjective. From certain angles, she actually did quite well, getting married, having a family. A lot of them sort of keep trying to continue their duties, and wind up getting killed when they're discovered. But as a species, both angels and demons have that inborn drive, and it doesn't go away after they don't have the calling anymore. I always offer the position of working for me, helping keep the balance, but it's actually very few who take me up on it."

Dorian saw her smiling but had a hard time meeting with one of his own. “I wouldn’t go that far,” he pointed out about his mother. She’d abandoned her youngest son and created Dorian and Mathias into what they were now, which wasn’t always great. “I get that though, about that drive. I don’t know if she ever lost hers. And I can see why offering to keep balance would be hard on someone like her. She was more prone to chaos, which tends to war with balance on occasion.” It could work, but there was a fine line with it and few were capable of walking that line.

"You know, it would enrage her to no end, but she actually did more for me and the balance in this world than almost anyone." Star said, smirking. "I got all of her boys." she pointed out. So even if Azura hadn't wanted anything to do with Star, in fact cursed her name to this day--she'd provided the world with three Horsemen, who's driving goal was to see the world kept turning. "As for it being difficult, it's actually difficult for both sides. See, the problem with true balance is you can't just do good things and thwart evil and call it a day. You have to make sure things actually even out. So, there are some places where good is the more overwhelming force, so..." she trailed off, making a vague gesture. "Ideally, you get Fallen and Ascended to work together. They can task out things that appeals to either side more, and do the other things together. Though I'm sure you can imagine that doesn't happen often."

Dorian couldn’t help but smile at that. “You should send her a thank you note. It ought to enrage her to no end,” he said, rather enjoying the idea of thoroughly pissing his mother off. “So you wind up with angels and demons on either side of things, occasionally going against their grain.” He understood a lot that, having seen the way what he did melded with what his brothers did. Thankfully at this point, Famine’s work was mostly objective, putting the right knowledge in places, but Dorian knew full well what the right knowledge meant in some cases and he knew how reasonable it was for Death to follow in his wake. The somber idea got rid of the smile for a moment and he shook his head. “No I can’t see them working together. Not from what I’ve experienced.” He was quiet, watching the empty space in the store again. “Do you worry about them? Them ones like her who seem oddly curious?” Maybe it was just in Dorian to worry about strangers.

"It happens. Just like I said, not all that terribly often." Star told him. "I worry about everyone." She stood straight, and walked along the nearest shelf. "I worry about angels, I worry about demons, I worry about people, and everything inbetween. Questions aren't worrisome. Questions can be answered."

He watched, wishing more could be gathered from just the way she moved, but he knew she was more complex than that. “We’re alike in that regard then,” he told her. He worried about almost everyone that walked through the doors of his shop and so many of the people that had crossed his path before. “Both in our worries and our attitude towards questions, though I suppose I still find the root of questions worrisome.”

"Well, in this case I happen to know why she wants to know." Star said. "But either way, sometimes people just need answers. It makes them feel more secure in their world. Having unanswered queries leaves them feeling like they aren't on steady footing. So, even if they get answers that don't really turn out well, it still makes them feel better because they know."

Dorian gave her a curious look at the fact that she knew what the woman had been asking about, but he didn’t question it himself. He knew better than to pry into others’ business. “And that’s where I come in in a way I suppose. Trying to answer the questions.” He’d always played that role, before his mantle had been accepted. Again he rubbed the mark in his chest without much thought, just considering things. “I do have a question, something that I hadn’t thought about to ask earlier, but since you’re here...” He waited, giving her ground to refuse to answer.

"That's where you come in." she agreed, nodding with a smile. Then she walked back over to him, standing squarely in front of him, eyes on his. "Go ahead." she encouraged.

“Caleb,” Dorian said with a little sigh. “He miscalculated recently and got himself in a bit of a scrape. I’m no field doctor, but he should have bled out Star. I had too much of his blood just on me from trying to patch him up and carry him out of there. That’s not counting what was on the ground when we left.” He drug a hand through his hair, studying her for a moment. “He should have died and didn’t, which I’m grateful for, but well the only guess I have is that wish and I have no idea what it means.”

"You got a wish, and it's holding." Star told him. "He will not be the first to go. You and Math are still alive and well, so he'll survive whatever happens to him." she explained. "You are right, he should have died. He would have, normally. But because of what you did, he didn't, and he'll heal up just fine, and continue what he does."

Dorian couldn’t help the silence that followed what she said. It made sense, it was exactly what he’d wished for, but hearing it like that, just plainly stated made it seem too good to be true. “It’s...it’s good to know. Provided he doesn’t hate me for it.” Not that he seemed upset about it when they’d talked, but Caleb didn’t like someone messing with his own fate and Dorian had done just that. “I’m glad though. That there’s something extra there. Thanks, for clarifying it at least.”

"You're welcome." Star said. "I'm glad you made the wish. Death's line of duty...it's hazardous at best. Though technically, he was on a personal sort of mission, but he wasn't using Death tools to do it, so it's no conflict of interest."

“Thanks. It’s nice to hear I did something close to right.” Dorian might have gotten the confidence back but he still appreciated the assurance. “Caleb’s life is hazardous, not just because of being Death obviously and...I know he’s not looking to end it anymore, but I have a feeling he’s far more accepting of that end than most. I guess that’s why you picked him for Death and not me or Mathias, but that doesn’t make me sleep any easier.”

"Hey. No self deprecating language to me. I got you into a position of ultimate authority for a reason." Star told him. "You do a lot of things right." She paused a long moment, watching him. "I chose him for death because he had the correct mentality for it. He already was doing what would be required of him, and doing it because he believed in it. It doesn't have anything to do with his sliding scale of value on his own life."

“Yes ma’am,” Dorian said with a nod. He was getting better with that at least. When she explained herself, he leaned back listening to her and considering it before answering. “I’m actually glad to hear that. I’m glad it’s not that reckless abandon he has,” Dorian said slowly, choosing his words carefully. “I like to think he’s getting better with that and I want him to keep getting better.” And if he needed it for Death...then Caleb was bound to hit a glass ceiling. “What we’re doing, who we’ve become, the three of us, it’s important to me, but he is too. Just as much.”

"It wouldn't be very prudent to get someone in the job who'll only last two weeks." Star said, smiling a little. "I want someone with staying power. He has it, he's pretty damn good, considering. And, as he gets older, he'll refine more. I was rather hoping he'd get over the suicidal tendencies. So far, it seems like he has." She nodded to Dorian. "It's part of why I wanted the three of you. I think you're more likely to stay a working unit if you're invested in each other. And your family seems to have a rather interesting quality. Even if you’re entirely at odds, you still give a damn, and will drop everything to help."

“Not prudent at all,” Dorian said with a nod. “And he is getting better, or so it seems.” When she described his family he couldn’t help but smile a little, shaking his head. “That’s us. Loyal to a fault. Like Mathias, I want to punch him most days but god forbid someone else get close.” He laughed at himself lightly, knowing how ridiculous it sounded.

"It's a good quality for you to have. Especially in your position. You'll need to be able to rely on each other, and have the ability to put personal squabbles aside." Star said. "It made you three perfect candidates."

“That I never thought I would hear. The three of us, perfect candidates for something,” Dorian said with another laugh. He went back to looking at her, studying her features for a moment. “You said I could mark my own, what would that even entail?”

"The process? You touch someone where you want the mark, and you'll instinctually know what to do. It'll transfer the mark accordingly." Star told him, knowing it was one of those things that didn't come with an instruction manual.

Dorian nodded, appreciating the instructions. “And the purpose? Or the reasons? I can’t...well I can’t think of a soul who I’d bound to me in any way. Or why? Would they be able to help?” That was really where his question was rooted in, the need.

Star arched a brow at him. "Haven't we gone over this before?" she asked. "The purpose is whatever you want. To have people to help you if you need it, to have partners in your endeavor. Figure it out, dear. If you can't come up with anything, then it's probably not the right time to be considering it."

“I don’t know if we got into the finer points,” Dorian clarified. What she said about timing made sense and he nodded. “It probably just isn’t the right time then. Maybe I’ll figure it out eventually.” For now it seemed to be a one man job and the two people in his life he’d even consider it for wouldn’t take the offer.

"You'll get there." Star promised. "Eventually it'll click for you. You'll work out what you want to do with it, and when. Don't rush it. You just got the job." She told him with a wink.

Dorian nodded again, taking the advice to heart. He’d figure it out when it made sense and until then, it was just something to be mindful of. “Glad you dropped in,” he told her, surprised at how much he believed the words when he said them. Conversing with her had been informative, and pleasant, not something he would have expected.

“Any time, dear.” Star told him. And, after a smooch on the cheek, she was gone.