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Flat on his back, Lupin lie on the concrete roof of the apartment complex, staring up at the night sky. There was a slight breeze, but nothing too harsh. He was only wearing a pair of shorts though, so it was a little chilly, but not anywhere near strong enough to break him out of his mental fishbowl. Thoughts trapped, sloshing around on the inside in what can only be described as a sorrowful soup of garbled nonsense. The fishbowl was made of some hefty glass, too; it wasn’t breaking anytime soon.
Gazing at the stars, his limited knowledge of constellations bubbled to the surface of his thoughts. He’d never bothered to learn much about it; he’d never had to plan a heist where it was crucial information. He could see the Big Dipper… or something. That was the one that looked like a saucepan, right? He sighed, his eyes ready to glaze over.
Any semblance of human-imposed meaning he could milk from the night sky vanished. He was an unimaginably tiny thing. Unimaginably powerless, too. He and the planets could gaze back and forth, but he knew that he was comforted by their distance. He didn’t need to perceive his size in a way he could visually comprehend. Didn’t want to, either. He knew he was small enough.
Hell, his tiny flame would probably be swallowed up by the world he was on before he could even think about being something bigger. Vast land, powerful people, savage violence. It all stopped his fire from burning as bright as it could. He was just a big-mouthed, pitiful spark in the end, wasn’t he? Vomiting lies like some sort of moral food poisoning had infested his sense of self.
The door to the roof clicked gently. He heard the shick of a lighter, then smelt the musk of cigarette smoke. The click of shoes on concrete resounded as Jigen entered his peripheral vision. Looking over Lupin, he stood for a moment. Took a drag of his cigarette, and slowly sighed it back out, the smoke coiling off into the dark. He returned his lighter to his jacket, and slipped his hands into his pockets. “What’s goin’ on, Lupin?” He asked, his question dinking the side of his fishbowl.
“Nothin’…” he answered slowly, still looking up past him into the sky.
“Doesn’t look like nothing,” he stated, leisurely walking over to the ledge.
He gave a lazy blink in response as Jigen sat down out of his vision.
“Are you upset about something?” The useless question was muffled from the other side of the glass.
Another quiet, slow blink. He leadenly trailed his eyes all the way up, and tilted his head to get a look at Jigen, who sat with his back to him. Stark against the sky, his familiar silhouette looked painted onto the starry backdrop, like he wasn’t even there. Another bloom of smoke billowed out and got caught on the wind. Lupin returned his gaze straight upwards.
“Lupin,” Jigen called again.
Oh yeah… he’d just asked him something, right? “…What?” His voice was disconnected from his mouth as if he was mouthing someone else’s words.
“Are you upset?” He asked, enunciating his question with a hint of annoyance at having to repeat himself.
The question tried harder that time to actually get under the lip of the bowl. He felt as it drifted in the water surrounding his head. Was he upset…? “No…”
“Well ya look real messed up, man.”
“I do, do I…?” He meant it rhetorically, but he knew he’d be hearing some sort of-
“Yeah, more than you usually do.”
-jab in response.
Every word that exited Jigen’s mouth just seemed scripted beforehand, like the two of them were performers, and insulting each other was just part of the script. So Lupin couldn’t even begin to consider feeling hurt by what he said. Giving another slow, laboured glance, he found Jigen’s head had turned toward him slightly to keep an eye on him. He stared into that dark void beneath the brim of his hat. Maybe they were making eye contact, maybe they weren’t. What did it really matter anyway, if Jigen wasn’t there. “Hmph,” he said, finally turning his head back away from Lupin.
He didn’t do the same. Staring intently at his back, his own mind cupped its hands over his eyes, feeding him the sensation of what it would be like to give his gunman a quick, harsh shove off the rooftop. To grip the ledge, listening to the man scream in fear and confusion as he fell, his abrupt silence punctuated by a sickly, echoing crack. The order of operations was simple, made even more so by the fact he wasn’t wearing any noisy clothes or shoes. He could so clearly see himself sitting up, leaning onto a knee, pausing, before darting towards him. The thud as his palms collided with his back, and the shiny whites of his eyes as his hat was lifted up by his raised eyebrows.
A blink, and he was back in his body again. Or at least adjacent to it. He was still staring. On his back. Arms by his side. Oh, and Jigen’s eyes were on him again. And his hand… poised over his gun.
“What’re ya thinkin’ about, Lupin?” He snuffed his cigarette out on the ledge.
He bolted himself onto his feet as Jigen whipped around and fired. He did his perfect little dance around the bullets, and his body was riddled with adrenaline up until the moment Jigen’s magnum let out the dry click from being out of ammo. Only a couple seconds, but he felt as if the whole world had just released its skin-tight seal on his existence in those few moments.
He slouched, out of breath. “What the hell was that??!” He yelled, watching as Jigen holstered his gun.
“What? I wasn’t gonna hit you,” he said, standing up.
“Only because I got out of the way!”
“Yeah.”
“Aargh! And you say I’M insufferable to be around!”
“Uh-huh, guess that’s why we make a good team.” As he walked past him, he gave him a hearty pat on the back, and, just for a moment, he got a real glimpse of his eyes from the correct angle. “You should probably head in. Big day tomorrow.” He opened the door back to the inside of the complex, flicking him another glance. Lupin stood, almost dumbfounded- and for no real reason he could discern. His heart was still jamming to the beat of his adrenaline, and beneath where he was standing was a puddle of water, strewn with thick glistening pieces of curved glass. The pathetic wet plop of a goldfish struggling against the concrete occupied the silence.
Jigen’s gaze lingered. “You off with the friggin’ fairies again?”
Another blink as Lupin furrowed his brow in a way he could sense looked bratty. “No.” He walked towards the door as well.