Participants:
| Scene Title | Dee Aych Ess |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | What do you get when you mix a DEoA agent with a carnie? Vinegger — Surprising revelations all around. |
| Date | October 12, 2010 |
DEoA HQ — Interview Room 1A
Vincent's office is impressive. Sweeping view of the city, heavy desk, Department seal cast and mounted in thick metal to glower down upon all who enter.
But Vincent isn't in his office.
He's in a sterile gray room so many feet underground, everything concrete and steel and a single wan fluorescent lamp recessed into the ceiling. Which feels low.
The table he's seated at is made from the same stuff as the three-piece suit security was kind enough to deliver Edgar of at the door: heavy chains restricting reach and stride uncuffed from wrists and ankles and belt before they locked the door behind him. He's better dressed, obviously — a shade more severe than usual in coal black over a sootier shade of gray. His tie is somber as it is sharp; his cuffs are buttoned and his pen is clicked over a file folder whose label Edgar hardly needs to read. A few abrasions along the back of his right hand and some aggravation around the scar that winds around his wrist out from under his cuff are the only indications he has been involved in any kind of altercation. There are also circles around his eyes, but they are unrelated.
"Have a seat," is one of those things that sounds like an offer or suggestion but clearly isn't, for all that Lazzaro doesn't look up from the open file when he says it. Utterly nonplussed.
This likely has something to do with the fact that Edgar is stuffed to the gills with suppressant.
And he is not.
It's just with a little hostility that Edgar lands in his seat across from the Agent. Glowering at him through narrowed eyes, the former speedster rubs at his wrists to get the feeling back. It's been a little too long without his ability and the suppressants do more to make him angry than any of the other 'special treats' he's been getting.
To see the balding man well and alive after a leap from such a high place is somewhat of a surprise, though it really shouldn't be. After all, it's been made quite clear that he failed his attempt to end Praeger.
The carnie's lips remain sealed and his eyes wander around the room, looking for anything that could be the slightest bit useful in his predicament. A paperclip, pen, sheaf of paper, the table (which is unfortunately bolted down), chairs (same problem), Edgar's options are coming up rather slim.
There is the pen.
Otherwise, Vincent's not wearing any rings. There's no bud in his ear and no slice of observation glass in sight to break up the pitted monotony of concrete on every side. Every wall as dully uninspiring as the last.
Wandering eyes taken in with a stare as steady as the locked hold of the door he was originally hefted in through, Vincent blinks slow and thinly-vieled tolerance for the effort before he sets to writing. Date. Time. Case number.
He writes deliberately, ball point wicking tacky with ink against otherwise unsullied paper. Painfully slow. Every letter a standalone effort in symmetry and line.
"Have anything you want to say to me?"
An incredulous expression crosses the angry carnie's features and after a few rapid blinks, Edgar's staring Vincent with a rather blank expression on his face. A man of already little words struck dumb by such a simple question.
"Like wha'?" His British accent isn't hard to place, for someone from the area. Though a little muddled from years of travel, he's still got quite a bit of Bradford brogue. The answer to the agent's question is fairly uninspired and lacking the venom one would expect from such a situation.
Sharp blue eyes take in every letter that's penned in upside down from his vantage, though not incredibly gifted in the education department, he's not severely lacking. Date. Time. Care number. The block letters that seem as uninspired as the decorating in the cell, all of it adding up to a place that, for the record, equals less fun than a cage of wild little people.
"Well," says Vincent.
Well.
Brows tipped up in bland acknowledgment of his own lack of inspiration in the realm of suggestion, Vincent clk-clicks once more, thumb riding up deliberately over the polished release, so that even the second click comes on a delay as the ball retracts up behind the point. "You could start by telling me why you dropkicked my supervisor off of a building."
There's no attempted necessary, yet. Edgar definitely did succeed at kicking Praeger off a building. That the Departmental agent seated across from him is so thoroughly nonplussed probably has more to do with the fact that he never quite hit the pavement. "I mean," he continues after a beat, pen turned over once between his fingers, "if you're sorry or anything, I can certainly pass on the message."
A small smirk forms on Edgar's lips as he glances up at the ceiling, obviously remembering the kick at high speeds. "Yeah, i' was a good kick." The smirk gets a small rasp of a laugh as Edgar's hands come up on the table to drum nervously against the top with his thumbs. "I'm only sorry tha' 'e didn' hi' the bottom."
Shrugging, the carnie studies Vincent for the length of a pregnant pause before the smirk falls from his face and his lip curls slightly into a sneer. "As fer why… i' don' matter much does i'? 'E's no' dead yet."
Vincent may be a man worth studying, for all that his detachment leaves little in the way of cracks and crevaces to pry into. He's short. Balding. Law enforcement all his life. Clearly. Fussily neat from the crease of his collar to the careful maintenance of bristly beard growth cut down close to the (currently lax) lock of his jaw. A scar to match the one at his wrist arcs subtle over his right ear, almost following the mold of his skull. His eyebrows generally have more to say than the rest of him.
For instance, right now, he looks faintly skeptical.
Very faintly.
"Well," he says. Again. Evenly. "I'd like to know anyway, pending your inevitable jailbreak."
Raising his eyebrows, Edgar leans forward little a little, an expression of great interest crossing his features. "Whad'you mean my inevitable jailbreak?" There's a somewhat skeptical wash in his eyes as if he can't really believe what he's hearing and then he squints a little, observing the smaller man as he leans back in his chair. "If you mean Messiah… they ain' comin'.. If you didn' notice, cousin, they lef' me up there for you folk."
His brow creases and the carnie looks down to the left, away from the other man. "S'jus' like before, y'know… when they pu' me in Moab." Of course, Vincent has the file, it's likely that the man's personal nemesis has been notified of his incarceration as well.
"Well you didn't succeed. Given your high-profile contacts and the fact that I think it's highly unlikely you'll be given the death penalty for attempted murder of a federal official, assuming you don't give up anything that causes them great harm — " sooner or later, is the implication of his trailing off to turn the page in his file folder to something with finer print.
His brows twitch down into a knit at that next thing — Moab — and he's quiet for a solid twenty or thirty seconds while he skims. First this page, then the next. And one more. At length, he's forced to leave off it in a scuff of his right hand across his chin, perplexed less subtly than he'd probably like to be. He didn't anticipate being perplexed at all.
"What happened in Moab?"
"I sa' there, day af'er day, rottin'… Some Dee-Aych-Ess woman — " The letters are emitted slowly, Edgar's lips curled into a sneer as he relates the story, " — pu' a bullet through an innocent li'l girl… One'a my fam'ly. So I tried teh stop 'em from doin' any more in. All o' you people, you can kill as free as you like, i' don' matter s'long as they're evolved, eh?"
The carnie turns his head a little more to stare at the wall, the silvery scar in his patchy beard catching the light just a enough to highlight it. "We're no' animals… Jennie, she 'adn' even made i' to 'er tenth birthday." Turning back to Vincent, there's a distinct flash of hatred as the juggler sniffs a single laugh, the smirk on his face breaking the humorless expression. "So forgive me, sir, if I don' feel guilty 'bou' tryin' teh kill any o' yours."
Dee-Aych-Ess very briefly, once upon a time, when the DoEA was still a twinkle in Praeger's eye, Vincent finds himself staring, boot black eyes as warily removed as they are intent. Like someone hearing something they aren't sure they want to believe, really. Even if they need to hear it. And already know it's probably true.
"Of my what?" inquired mildly a beat later isn't quite enough to distract from the section of this interview he's really interested in. He's restless again, too — composure broken somewhat by a pass of his right hand across the back of his skull and collar. "Do you know the woman's name?"
"Agent. Lauren. Gilmore." The words are well practiced, rolling off the man's tongue as easily as his own mother's, except these ones have no love attached to them. Edgar glances down at the paper and then flits his eyes to the pen, almost expecting it to be written down. "Wan' me to describe 'er t'you? 'Cause 'er face is be'er known teh me than my own. Them people tore apar' my fam'ly, I didn' care nothin' abou' the outside until they came in."
Closing his mouth, the carnie's lips curl into an unpleasant frown and he crosses his arms over his chest. There's a hostility in his stance, though he's not fool enough to do anything about it at all. Perhaps if there weren't inhibitors pumped into his system but not right now.
"I'll remember the name," says Vincent. And he'd better, because he doesn't write it down. Instead, after reaching under the table to pry away some manner of wireless attachment, he flips it open and extracts a battery with a practiced twitch of his thumb.
"Okay," he says next. Okay. "We have about five minutes before someone becomes curious about why I've done this. I need you to tell me what you know about Moab." He's still not writing, pen discarded and potentially forgotten between his hands. One with the watch battery, the other empty. "If it's any consolation," he adds in thumbing a memory card out next, "I am not one of them."
Straightening up, Edgar gives Vincent an astonished look, blinking just a couple of times as he shakes his head and licks his lips. "'Ang on then, y'didn' know? Bu' you're .. " A suit. Government. One of them. Bewildered, Edgar just looks down at his knees and furrows his eyebrows.
"I's pu' in there after they raided the carnival. Sure, I mean, I deserved some punishmen' fer wha' I done… I needed teh find my redemption… Bu' tha' place… They treat dogs on death row be'er." Angling his chin again, Edgar fingers the scar, stretching his skin just a little to give Vincent a better look. "Ev'ryone in there tha' can live withou' their ability, they ge' an injection ev'ry mornin'. When i' all disappeared, i' took three days before I could run again."
If Vincent is one of them, none of this will come as a surprise. He'll already know it. "Ev'ryone 'oo's been in Moab, they'll 'ave one'a these in the same place as me. Y'don' ge' no trial before you ge' sen' there. Evolved people, we're no' 'uman. Innocen' people go' thrown in there when they didn' mean to do no 'arm. Instead've teachin' 'em teh use wha' they 'ave teh build sum'then be'er… they ge' tossed."
It's hard to tell how much Lazzaro does or doesn't know, really. He certainly doesn't look surprised. But he is listening awfully hard, brow hooded and deep-set eyes unblinking in their increasingly perpetually purple shadows. Unruffled overall, expression as concisely closed off as the gray of his collar, he is still a moment before he starts to reapply the battery back into its cradle.
"Did you escape or were you ultimately released?" as a question is more telling than any more physical reaction could be. No matter how nice his suit is or how shiny his badge — he doesn't know about Moab.
"Neither," Edgar replies honestly, pursing his lips together when he hears the click of the battery. "Sum'then 'appened an' i' was jus' gone. I woke up in some place in the middle'uh Mexico, no clothes. You migh' think I'm daft… bu' I ain' daft enough teh turn myself in af'er gettin' a blessin' like tha'."
The Speedster raises one hand to scratch under his eye, silencing for just a moment before a grim expression sets on his face again. "I bin' runnin' from 'er though… Agent Gilmore, I ain' lettin' 'em take me back teh no place like tha'. I'll kill myself an' any 'oo try teh take me… Keep tha' in mind, cousin, before you call 'em."
"I won't be calling anyone," says Vincent, battery clicked in and device carefully replaced beneath the table, sans memory card.
"But I'm intelligence, Mr. Smythe. Not enforcement. And you did make an attempt on Secretary Praeger's life. I'm not in a position to help you, and you are not in any position to be helped." The memory card is dipped into his pocket as he pushes to his feet, file closed once he's up. Pen collected. "Homeland Security has already made numerous attempts to claw you from our custody. Unfortunately for you, it's only a matter of time before they succeed."
File in hand, Lazzaro lingers in static silence a moment. Like he might say something else. But he turns to go quietly instead, scraped knuckles clanged twice against the seal on the door. Interview over.