behindcloseddoors | CLOSED ♔ it was anything but hear the voice that says that we're all basically alone

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CLOSED ♔ it was anything but hear the voice that says that we're all basically alone

WHO || Arthur Pendragon, Wynnefalshond, Dumage Moulet, Mark Sandazhard [closed]
WHAT || ? ? ?
WHERE || A first floor hallway
WHEN || Tues, Feb 21st, evening, right before the Chicago briefing
HOW || Actionspam or prose or whatnot.

Just because Arthur almost died in training less than a week ago is hardly any reason to slack, and Fred and company don't go any lighter on him for what happened. There might be a bit of good-natured ribbing about getting nearly killed by a girl (whenever the women weren't in earshot), particularly by the elder fighters from the Shadow World who invested less awe in the Arthurian legends in the first place, but they were all too happy to spar anytime. So by the end of each training session, even a warrior in good shape would find himself winded and in need of a break. It's not quite time for evening meal yet as Arthur descends from the second floor in the direction of the squire rooms and baths.

It's unusual to find Wynn in this section of the castle, as he tends to make himself rare in the first place, barely making appearances even in the training oriented rooms of the castle. Hearing his voice, therefore, emanating from a slightly ajar door in the stretch of rooms largely reserved for squires rings as slightly unusual. He seems to be in the middle of some parting words.

"... think you might benefit from sharing a few words with him, in time. Though for the time being, I would suggest focusing on the assignment you'll be receiving today."

An answering male voice from within asks: "But if you hear from Jack, you'll--" His voice is laced with strained anxiety, and Wynn cuts him off smoothly.

"Of course." And with that, Wynn moves out into the hallway, where he sees Arthur just a couple yards away. He pauses, hand on the door handle, looking as if he was actually so preoccupied that he was surprised to see anyone there, so much as he can evince surprise at anything.

He recovers within the span of an instant, nodding to Arthur in greeting as he steps towards him, though he angles to walk past him without really seeming inclined to stop.

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Truly, Arthur's reaction perhaps isn't as extreme as Mark's, but it's certainly coming from the same school of emotion. His eyes widen, the tips of his ears go scarlet, and his only movement is the way his eyes dart between the visibly ravaged Sandazhard and the woman he doesn't know, though he's fairly certain is a fellow Knight.

Something about her gaze on him makes him want to straighten his shoulders, maybe tuck in his stomach, touch his hair, his jaw. But his shock at the situation stills his nervous gestures.

"Er, I'm very sorry," Arthur very nearly stammers, wishing perhaps that he'd just knocked and gone away. "I didn't mean to interrupt... any sort of, er... tryst."

Immediately he winces, wishing he could take that word back.

"That is," he adds, trying and failing to salvage the situation. "I can — go."

Dumage seems quite pleased with Arthur's word choice, her smile curving up even more wickedly as she seems about to respond, when suddenly Mark springs to life behind her, moving forward to take her by the shoulders and give them a definitely not-affectionate squeeze of warning, as he pries her from her spot in the doorway and moves her aside.

"There's no ... trysting. Tryst-free." His voice is definitely strained, with anxiety and something more difficult to define. "Dumage was just going." He looks back at her, his expression somewhat desperate, which mostly seems to amuse her.

"Of course I was," she says, trailing a hand across his chest deliberately as she crosses in front of him to move through the door, purposefully not leaving a lot of space between herself and Arthur during the movement either. "You two boys have fun now."

With that, she saunters off down the hallway, heels clicking behind her, leaving Mark to stand there, mouth slightly agape.

Arthur watches her go, bemused and still a little flushed, thoroughly unused to that sort of behaviour in a woman. Eventually he recovers himself and turns back to Sir Sandazhard, clearing his throat.

"You've got a little, ah..." Arthur taps the corner of his own mouth, the same place on Mark's face that's been debauched by lip gloss. He swallows, throat bobbing. "Well, that was certainly... may I come in?"

Mark's head snaps back at Arthur's words, and he stares at him uncomprehending for a second, raising one hand to mirror the man's motions. When it sinks in what he's getting at, his embarrassment only seems to ramp up a notch and he mutters "Oh geez" pawing at his chin, and ducking back into the room, heading for a bureau so that he can check things out in the mirror. He not only scrubs off the lip gloss, but rakes his fingers through his hair, and then seems to notice his collar, and awkwardly fumbles to refasten it, trying to avoid Arthur's gaze in the reflection.

"Of course, uh... course you can. Just give me a ..." He turns around when he's apparently completed his cursory touch-up and glances around the room for anything incriminating, but the only sign of anything out of place is the red chair scraped away from its spot by the wall. He wipes a palm across his mouth before focusing back on Arthur, and then seeming to realize something else that fills him with dread. "I'm sorry. This isn't how I wanted to--" He takes a deep breath and looks down, licking his lips, before forcing a smile and meeting his gaze, his entire posture seeming to tighten up like a soldier. "... It's an honor, your Highness."

It's very nearly comedic. Arthur enters the room as Mark fixes his hair so he looks less like he's just been doing the nasty with a coworker, and pretends to be interested in the decor, toying absently with an ornament until the other man apologizes.

"Course it is." Arthur gives him a wry look, not entirely sure what to do with his sudden change in demeanor. "You are Mark Sandazhard, are you not? It's a pleasure to meet you."

He decides the man looks uncomfortable enough that nothing could actually be more awkward, so he crosses and offers a handshake. "Any idea why I'm here?"

Because he has pretty much none.

Mark eyes the hand for a beat, the question seeming to erect a wall of caution within the man. But he also seems to interpret the gesture as a statement on status in the room and reaches out to clap his hand into the other's. His grip is strong but he seems eager to let go. The wheels in his head are visibly clicking.

"It must be... that I..." the words are drawn out, clearly an excuse to figure out what to place at the end of them. "Told him I wanted to meet you."

He smiles upon the pronouncement, but it looks slightly off-kilter. And the color still hasn't returned to his cheeks.

The odd discomfort of the man has Arthur shifting his weight a little backwards once the handshake ends, lifting his chin, briefly sucking thoughtfully on his lower lip as he reanalyzes Mark's obvious distress at his presence, which is perhaps not purely a result of being caught in a somewhat compromising position.

"I see." His tone makes it apparent that he doesn't, and his eyes narrow a little. But he doesn't want to make any assumptions. Each and every knight here has sworn the same vows he has, and likely upheld them for far longer, and he will not disrespect any of them. At least, not until his squiring period is over. But he still asks questions like he's fully entitled to the answer.

"And why's that?"

"Why?" Mark echoes, once again quite obviously buying himself a moment of time. He looks the other man up and down, gesturing towards him. "Well, I mean... King Arthur. Who wouldn't, right?" Laughter follows, which sounds increasingly nervous, as he seems to realize this is entirely the wrong tack to take. The chuckles die out pathetically and his eyes scrape the floor again.

"I mean... I guess I just wanted to know what you were ... actually like. The whole ... man not the myth... thing." He looks back up, scratching the back of his head. "It was just an idle comment, I have no clue why Wynn ... took it seriously." He starts backing up slightly as he talks, and then points to the door with a hand in a sort of defeated way. "And I'm ... sorry for wasting your time."

When he points to the door, Arthur looks at it for a moment before looking back to the slump-shouldered, nervous man before him. What the hell. He has very little else to do, and he'd like to get to know each and ever knight in the organization, as impossible as that goal may seem. Where better to start than the one standing before him?

"I don't know that kicking me out is a good way to go about getting to know me," Arthur says, a little wryly. He glances around, looking for somewhere comfortable to sit. "If I'm intruding, by all means. But if you'd like to talk..." He gives a tilted, one-sided shrug, looking back to Mark. "Then let's."

Besides the suspect chair that's been edged out in the room, there's a still-made and unruffled bed, and two high backed chairs set against the wall. Mark seems to immediately regret his attempts to shove Arthur out, but they appear to have born of something reflexive, rather than a calculated effort, as he doesn't object this time and looks around a moment, before plopping onto the very corner of the bed in a somewhat defeated manner.

"Right, sorry..." He clasps his hands together between his knees, considering for a moment, before he comes right out with: "So how did you get here, exactly? I mean I'm pretty sure... time traveling's new around here."

Arthur draws forward a high-backed chair, not sure that he wants to risk the red chair. He sits in it, slouching a little, though the armour doesn't allow for much.

"I didn't travel in time," Arthur snorts, not even sure how that would work. Though he supposes it's a reasonable assumption, if such a thing were possible. If there weren't a more obvious means of unlikely transportation known well to the Knights.

"I came through the Veil."

The look Mark cuts him makes it clear that he thinks the King might be suffering some residual brain damage from his bout with Buffy.

"... But the Veil is between the Shadow World and this world. Not the past and the future." It doesn't sound like an accusation, exactly, but there's a definite doubt behind his words. "So how can you be famous in this world, but from another one?"

"Do you really expect me to be able to answer that?" Arthur asks, pulling a face. He's a little offended by that look. "If I'd jumped from my time to yours there wouldn't be any stories about all the great deeds I'm supposed to eventually do, would there?"

And he's annoyed, so he doesn't even consider the implications of telling Mark that he's maybe not yet the King Arthur of legend. He knows nothing except what Wynn's told him, but he wholly trusts the man not to have misled him. What was it he'd said, when he'd first found Arthur? He attempts to moderate his tone to something more conciliatory, in the hopes it makes him seem like he knows anything about what he's speaking of. "I was told perhaps it could be a similar world to ours, but simply ... running slow."

Mark's brows pinch together further, and he looks as if he's giving the matter serious consideration. It at least seems to have the effect of calming him down visibly, as he concentrates on the subject at hand. "No," he says slowly, "I suppose you wouldn't have any more of an idea than somebody who was from the Shadow World." Mark himself wasn't overly familiar with the idea of parallel universes, so he just nods at the description. "It's just that I'd never heard of anything like that before. And Wynn didn't really... offer any of us an explanation about it, just boom, announced King Arthur was going to be signing on. Kind of a shocker."

The thought of something seems to hit him, and he looks up at Arthur again, chin still lowered in thought. "Do you... I mean, do you think at least, that you remember everything, or did the Veil snag things?"

"The latter," Arthur admits, still not sure how much he's supposed to talk about this. He looks away. "Not everything, but a lot."

It's easy to feel Mark's gaze on him for a long moment, before he finally asks, as if he can't help himself: "Enough to miss it?" And then he seems to correct himself, rephrasing. "I mean, obviously you miss it if you remember some things, but I'm guessing it's different for you, since it's not just family, friends, that kind of thing. It's a whole--" Something causes him to hesitate briefly. "Whole kingdom."

"It is."

Arthur looks back at him. Nobody else has asked him this; perhaps because he enjoys the current world he's in so obviously. He has a purpose, and part of reaching that purpose is a sort of assimilation that has been teaching him the principles of humility the hard way.

"All right, yes," he says, somewhat grudgingly, blue eyes still studying Mark. "Camelot is everything to me. But I know one day I'll see it again." There's an earnest faith to the way he says that, as though he truly believes that this is trip to the future is just a holiday and not a permanent residency.

"You seem pretty sure about that." For a moment, his eyes hold Arthur's and there's a previously unseen glimpse of something there, a canny grasp of the subject, perhaps, or a shrewd reasoning that seems at odds with the fluster he presented only moments before. The question he poses is blunt, but not said with any seeming malice. If he evinced some fear of Arthur's presence before, it seems to dissolve in the space of this instant.

"What if you can't?"

Suddenly Arthur finds himself wondering again just why he's here.

"Then I continue to live and fight here until the end of my life," Arthur responds, trying to keep his tone impartial. It's only fact, and there are good causes here, after all. Camelot may end in ruins in Morgana's grasp, but perhaps not. Perhaps Princess Mithian or Queen Annis, both of whom do right by their people. But no. No, it's not worth dwelling on. "But I don't believe it will ever come to that."

The other man scrutinizes Arthur's face after his response, as if he's searching for something incredibly important and expects it to see written there. There's a frustration in his gaze, however, that makes it apparent that he can't find what he's looking for.

"I hope you're right," he says finally, and there seems to be a lot of sincerity crammed into the words, a sudden gravity to his entire demeanor. "I hope it's not impossible."

All right, it's time for the sixty-four thousand dollar question.

"Why?" Because this seems like it goes further than polite well-wishes. "Why would it matter to you?"

It's only now that he seems to realize that he's backed himself against the wall on this one, and immediately the grave man shatters back into the frazzled one, the incredibly thin-sounding excuse falling off his lips: "I'm just a sucker for happy endings."

Arthur's expression goes hard. "Don't ever lie to me." Dishonesty is the one thing he will not abide.

It's an obvious lie of exclusion - he probably isn't kidding about loving his happy endings, but that certainly isn't why this matters so much to him. Arthur's sudden intensity draws his eyes back up, and for a moment he looks once again like he did when Dumage yanked the door open on them - as if this might very well be the single worst moment of his entire existence. He stares back at the other silently for a long moment trying to compose himself beyond what seems like a terror that grips him to the very core.

What seems clear is that it's not even a fear of Arthur, but of what this moment might mean.

Finally, he says, in a tight voice that seems to beg the other to just let it lie: "It isn't something I can talk about."

Spot: 13 and also lmao.

poor arthur. 1/2

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sense motive: 15?

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