obediences | for ltbrownnoser.

"I'm not a civilian." Somehow that's the main detail that sticks in his craw, that makes Luther grind his teeth at the insinuation. Civilians are unpowered, untrained; they're the sheep that he protects.

As she keeps going, he keeps following: stepping easily over rubble, occasionally clambering a little, but easily keeping pace with his long legs. He realises in a distant sort of way that it's almost darkly funny, that they'd go from being complete strangers, to arguing, to him helplessly following her like there's a leash running taut between Sarah Sanders and Luther Hargreeves and it keeps dragging him after.

But he simply can't be alone again.

He doesn't say anything more for now, though, just keeps walking after that blonde figure (her shoulders set, swearing). Luther's starting to sift through the tools in his toolkit and deciding, in a roundabout way, to deal with her like he does Diego. Let that whiplash anger burn itself out if it can.

Rolling her eyes to herself, Sarah shakes her head. That would be his takeaway. "Just because you play superheroes with your family doesn't exempt you from being a civilian," she calls over her shoulder.

Frankly, it's infuriating that she can hear him just following her and if she weren't a better person, she'd have pulled her gun on him just to get the fucking point across. She's had that level of reaction trained out of her by the military years ago.

Almost an hour later, she's got to give it to the guy, he's a persistent little bugger. When Sarah has to stop and sit down because her legs feel a bit like jelly — she's a bit more out of shape than she'd realized, evidently — he's still trailing after her like a stray dog waiting for her to drop a scrap or something particularly tasty. She's too tired to keep shouting at him. Instead, she just looks up at him with her expression flat with the expression of her eyebrows both lifted.

"What." It isn't a question.

Once Luther comes to a stop a few feet away, he remains standing, unflappable; it's partially his inhuman durability and stamina, partially the fact that he's spent the last few weeks roaming this wasteland endlessly, so he's gotten used to that monotonous walking.

When Sarah looks up at him, he doesn't miss a beat in answering: "We can't split up."

Stolid as a boulder and just as implacable, as if the past hour hasn't happened at all. As if nothing's changed at all. Before that aggravating repetition might risk annoying her, though, Luther adds wearily, "Or, well, we can. But speaking from experience, I can tell you that solitude gets to you after a while. It's not fun and it's not healthy. And besides, two sets of eyes are better than one."

He's spent the past hour considering what angle to take with her, and in the end, he leans on the practicality of it, the pragmatic considerations, in the hopes that that'll break through and convince her. And that mention of solitude was carefully-phrased, as vague as he could make it, so it could mostly sound like he was just referring to the last few weeks and not anything longer.

Her eyebrows lift and her expression flattens with disinterest in being told that they can't split up because she's curious where, exactly, he's going to be coming from here; what the angle will be. One cannot just tell a stranger that she can't go off on her own without some follow-up unless one intends it as a threat.

He doesn't disappoint. Sarah frowns and heaves a long-suffering sigh. He's right, of course, but that doesn't make it any less appealing in her state of frustration.

For a long moment, Sarah just looks back at him. When she finally speaks, she sounds too tired to be angry. "I'm still angry," she warns him, even though she doesn't sound it at all. Emotionally, she's a little too drained to have any bite left. That could change, but for now, he's got that in his favor.

"There's bound to be something on this road sooner or later, but if you already know the road, I'm open to suggestions on whether to keep going in this direction or turn around," she offers almost grudgingly.

At least this is one of Luther's defining traits: that long-honed patience. You learn to practice a kind of zen mindfulness after years alone, but even before then, he'd been the steady pulse of the Umbrella Academy, plodding and predictable and measured in order to help keep the rest of them in line. The others could set their watches by him. Few things could chip through to fire up his anger properly; usually it was Diego at his worst, but even then, it was sometimes only accidental, when those barbed words hammered on a nerve that Diego didn't even know existed. So where Sarah's anger flared hot before finally burning down to these low embers, Luther's never caught fire in the first place.

"I don't know what's ahead, but there isn't much behind, either. There should be a big warehouse store a couple miles over that way, though." He jerks a thumb in the direction of north. "Do you know how to hotwire cars? Some of them are still running. If we can get one running, we can head out there, pick up what food we can, then start looking for well-situated shelter."

Talking logistics, making plans, all of it is just so comfortingly familiar that Luther realises a moment later that it's something of a comfort blanket. Falling back into strategising, building an approach for the mission they've found themselves in (even if it's not a mission at all). Just having someone to bounce those thoughts off is a relief, too. It's already an improvement over the last few weeks.

He shifts his weight from foot-to-foot, a little restlessly. There's an apology on the tip of his tongue, but he doesn't even know where to begin—

So he doesn't. Instead: "Ready to go?"

for ltbrownnoser.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject