Day 53: Breakfast

[thatdamnedninja]

With sigh that toed the ambiguous no-mans-land between soft and explosive, Yuffie collected a plateful of waffles with all the toppings. She was sure that, if nothing else, it'd making a pretty satisfying splat if-when?-she launched it at somebody's face, and that was all that counted

Comments

[unheroed]

It wasn't uncommon for Harvey to wake up angry, and yet today was particularly bad. Not to the point that he was throwing things and snapping at the nurses (he wasn't sure if he'd ever be quite that bad, quite that shaken), but he was still pissed. That stunt from the night before had been pointless; that thing hadn't told him anything that he didn't already know. If anything, it had just caused all of those feelings that he'd experienced when he'd first woken up in that Gotham hospital to resurface and churn inside of him.

He wouldn't let some unreal "past" self judge him for what he'd become. He was this way because he'd been forced to be, because some freak had decided that toying with people's lives and their sanity was a worthwhile endeavor. And that would never be right, and Harvey would never be like that. He was a bad person now, someone who judged his choices on the most arbitrary of reasons, but he was making a point and spitting back in the face of life. That was all

[gargantuanlaugh]

Boy, did the chief ever feel refreshed today! Last night had been beautiful! He must have gotten in a whole nine or ten hours of uninterrupted sleep. Although it hadn't been a dreamless sleep--he had dreamed the lights all came on at some point, but that kind of stuff didn't just happen here--there was nothing quite like a good nights rest after a stressful day. He felt like a new man. Maybe it would be a good idea to stay in at night more often. If only he could convince someone to cover the groundwork for him every other night or so

[unheroed]

If there was anyone who was going to cheer up Harvey, it wasn't this man. The moment he heard that voice, his shoulders tensed and his grip around his plastic cup (which he still wasn't drinking from) tightened. He slowly glanced up to see the man's strange features and his too-bright smile. After speaking with Lana he was even more suspicious of Gant than he'd been before. While part of him was tempted to just confront him about it, the man would either deny it up and down or completely lose whatever front he was putting forth

[gargantuanlaugh]

Aww, no smile in return for his company? Well, Gant hadn't really expected one from a man whose face was half... actually, he'd never seen Harvey with his bandages off. Who knew what had happened under there. Gant could only speculate that it wasn't pretty

[unheroed]

As far as Harvey was concerned, an unproductive night was a bad night. Gant didn't seem to agree with that, or he was at least trying to make it seem like he was a harmless old man who sometimes fell asleep when he didn't mean to. After the hints he'd gotten from Lana about the corruption in their department, though, Harvey found himself questioning all of Gant's actions even more than he had been

[gargantuanlaugh]

Gant had to hold back from rolling his eyes when Harvey mentioned shadows playing tricks on everyone. That's right. This was the reason why he had never retired, aside from wanting to keep in power. Honestly, all the young ones got yellower every passing year. Fearing their own shadows? If he left the law in the hands of these frightened little kids, who knew what great heights crime would rise to? And he'd had lots of hope for Harvey. He had thought the man had more grit than that

[unheroed]

It was a little surprising that Gant didn't ask for more information about the night before, but that might have had something to do with the fact that Harvey had done a good job of making it sound totally innocuous. Gant should have known better if he'd been in this place for any decent amount of time, but if he'd decided to brush it off? All the better. Harvey didn't want to talk about it, anyway.

As Gant explained what he'd been doing two nights ago, Harvey listened carefully. He couldn't help but feel like there was some insincerity in that tone, especially in the way he said "play bodyguard." As if it was something he did for fun rather than to actually help anyone. It might have sounded like he was doing the right thing on the surface, but Harvey couldn't help wondering if he'd had some ulterior motive.

"There's that, at least," he said with a shrug. "How equipped would you have been to help them if something had attacked?" Sure, the guy was a police chief, but as the man had already pointed out, he was getting on in years.

[gargantuanlaugh]

So he wanted to know Gant's offensive capabilities did he? Well, that was a question not easily answered. Even Gant wasn't sure if he was as spry as he had been in his detective days. Back then, he had been able to scale the fourteen staircases of the department without stopping for a rest--and that was a real feat. Actually, he was sure he wasn't quite that energetic anymore. Wow, it was amazing what just a few years of sitting in the lap of luxury could to one's physical strength. He had kept up his training and had gone swimming just about every day, but still

[unheroed]

Taking down something that was as strong as your normal person was simple enough, and so Harvey wasn't too shocked to hear about it. Granted, the people here were able to do things that defied all reason, like change someone's gender or teleport around a room at will. From the way Gant was talking, it was almost like he hadn't run into one of those brainwashed patients yet. Either that, or he had and he didn't want to discuss it

[gargantuanlaugh]

He had a feeling that Dent wasn't impressed. Not that he had expected much. Here he really didn't have any power, not yet. And it was true he wasn't as strong as he used to be. Oh, well. He'd just let it go for now. It wasn't all that important, anyway

[unheroed]

"Yeah, knives." Judging from the way that the man had asked and the look on his face, Harvey was guessing that Gant wasn't a fan, either. Which was kind of odd, since that counted as one thing that they had in common. Harvey would rather share as few traits with the police chief as possible, but at least this one was fairly innocuous. His dislike of knives was entirely thanks to the Joker, but he wondered what it was for Gant. There had to be some deeper reason for it...

Unfortunately, he'd made the wrong bet, as it turned out that Gant hadn't gotten the candlestick from the basement after all. The night with the randomly changing doors, of course. Though his guess had been a good one, he still felt foolish

[gargantuanlaugh]

"Knives. Nasty things." Gant shook his head, disgusted. His voice was rather solemn, a trait that didn't suit Gant. It didn't suit him in the least. "That was my last case, you know. A stabbing. The victim was one of my own men."

Sounded like he might have offered a bit too much information with that last comment, but he'd felt somewhat compelled to. Almost as though he needed to justify his dislike of blades. Or maybe he really just wanted to get it off his chest. It had been weighing on him lately. Poor, poor Goodman. He'd been sacrificed for something Gant had believed was a good cause. Keeping himself as Chief was a good cause. But he'd lost a good detective in the process, and the least nosy one at that. It really had been unfortunate. If only there hadn't been that knife

[unheroed]

Talk about too much information. Harvey was a bit surprised that Gant had decided to share something like that, but it was something that was meant to inspire pity rather than put him in a bad light. Chances were the man would say any number of things about his life so long as it didn't speak badly of him. Harvey didn't know if Gant expected a return explanation, but he wasn't getting it. Instead, he had a question. "Is that why you stopped and became a police chief?" He could see how an incident like that would turn someone off, though it would have made more sense to just leave the department entirely

[gargantuanlaugh]

"Eh, stopped? Stopped what?" The words were almost completely out of his mouth before Gant realized exactly what Harvey had been trying to say. Stopped being an investigator was what he meant. Suddenly, Gant didn't feel much like eating sugary syrup and waffles. Pushing his tray to the side, he threaded the fingers of his gloveless hands together and fixed his gaze on Harvey. It wasn't often that Gant felt offended. He could take a joke, but for someone to belittle his role back in the precinct

[unheroed]

It looked like he'd unintentionally hit a sore spot, since Gant finally let that carefree attitude drop for a moment so that he could make some sort of point. All he'd really meant to ask was if that had been the event had had made the man give up on hands-on investigation, but Gant had taken it as a hit against his ego if the way he was reacting was any indication

[gargantuanlaugh]

Gant gave Harvey a stout nod, then grinning again in his silly fashion. He really didn't like to play serious cop so much, but if it got him honest answers then it was worth it from time to time. "But of course I'm serious about my job. Why would you ever think otherwise?" And he was immediately back to the jokes. Really, he just couldn't help it. It was much to fun to play the oblivious old fool