Work Text:
Shaddiq butters his scones with the same meticulous grace he never seems to be without. Another orange-flavored one, Elan notes. All the scones he has eaten have been that flavor, except for one flecked with dark brown speckles; what might have been Earl Grey.
–What might have been an attempt to persuade Elan to try it for himself.
The one scone Elan ate sits in a crumbled crescent-moon sliver on his plate. (Plain, clotted cream; no strawberry jam. And Shaddiq raised his eyebrow and put down the little spoon, and since then the jam has sat untouched.)
He should not be here, Elan, in Grassley’s proverbial Garden. The Peil Grade has advised, with 97.83% certainty, that to collude with Shaddiq Zenelli is to court failure unnecessarily. He is its harbinger, or so the AI would have Elan think. But it’s just a machine, with no hope of grasping the human spirit; no way to calculate, save for some prescient witch’s manual input, for his bitterness at having been the fourth. At having been so close, and yet always too far, from ever being needed.
(In the dark of his dorm he wondered; wonders still, if he would rather have been the Fifth– for he lives in another’s shadow one way or the other, and what light he sees is but what He has devoured for himself.)
And so, when two of Shaddiq’s cohort found him, bearing an invitation, Elan accepted. The Peil Grade does not comprehend the suboptimal yearning of the imperfect flesh; will never understand: that which is forbidden is the most tempting thing of all.
But should he linger, doubt will creep its way in and work its roots around his heart. Already he has hesitated once today, let that serpent in with its silken voice. (And it is a testament to how cold the world is that Elan thinks even to let it speak; that gilded words might offer more comfort than the silence he has known.)
And so, scrutinizing his soiled plate, Elan says, “I doubt you called me here simply to play at a child’s tea party.”
Shaddiq looks up from his scone, from his intense scrutiny of the clotted cream bust he’s heaped upon it. “Of course not,” he answers, adequately mollified. “You see, Sabina had something come up today, and she’s normally who I’d take tea with. So, seeing as I had an empty seat, I thought it well enough that I acquaint myself with who I’ll be spending the next… forty or so years of my life bickering with?”
Shaddiq slips the dagger in so early, but surely, surely he cannot know the bite his words bring. Elan nudges his plate away on restless fingertips– something to touch, something cool. (Something here. Something real.)
Elan says, “And you picked Peil over Jeturk.”
“Well, isn’t that the reasonable choice?” Shaddiq asks. His scone disappears in a precise quartet of bites. Elan wonders, fleetingly, if he bothers to chew, or swallows it down whole– but no, that’s stupid. (And why does he think that, anyway?)
“Jeturk has grown complacent at the head of the mobile suit industry.” Shaddiq reaches for another scone. Plain, this time. “Sooner or later, something will unsettle their stride. Be it when Vim Jeturk steps down and hands the company over to his son, or if another company unveils a more intriguing product– once that’s in motion, I doubt a traditionalist mindset will keep up with the pace of progress.”
“And so you came to me?”
“Well, there’s that, and…” Shaddiq shrugs, an opalescent line dripping slowly down his knife. “From what I hear, Guel isn’t the type for afternoon tea, anyway. An afternoon duel, perhaps.”
Shaddiq smiles– shoulders slumped, hands upturned, disarming. Impeccably so. And Elan thinks– perhaps Three might have fallen for it; perhaps He might stab back at Shaddiq, just to play the game, but Elan is no longer interested in games. He hasn’t been for some time.
Across the table, Shaddiq’s smile flags. This, Elan can recognize. It’s the extra second the Peil Grade takes; the fluctuating of his expiration date; it all ends the same, with worried whispers, but never for him–
And Elan wonders, suddenly, if Shaddiq’s perfect smile is still perfect tucked behind his clever lips, when his teeth are backed up against the poison heavy on his tongue.
Shaddiq’s fingers tent over his plate. He remains still for an uncannily long moment. But then his smile is back; then he’s lifting the teapot with his hand splayed daintily over the lid to keep it still, and it’s as if nothing’s happened.
“Today’s tea is jasmine infused with muscat,” Shaddiq says, ducking his head with all the appropriate shyness a schoolboy should have, as if this is some admission– as if, with this second cup, he’s pouring out some of himself. The tea arcs in a swan-neck curve, and Elan thinks of faceless suits and perfect crystalline glasses. As the teapot settles, he wonders just why a Prince would know how to pour his own drink; he wonders which part of this tea Shaddiq would rather be– the gentle or the bitter or the sweet.
He must have betrayed some emotion, some subtle shift in his face– for Shaddiq’s eyes are bright upon him. “Is it too strong for your liking?” he asks. “We have sugar, if that’s what you’d like.”
A whirl of thoughts. If Elan Ceres should like sugar with his tea. If Elan Ceres would like sugar with this tea. If sugar would make this any more palatable to him. But he has accepted Shaddiq’s invitation; he is here already, and what is a little more?
Elan tilts his head, brings his mouth to the air above his cup. He breathes in the steam, sweet and dark and bold and bitter. –This is how it happens, he thinks. You give someone a foothold, and suddenly they want the whole of you.
Shaddiq must want something from him. Elan is certain of this. Everyone does– and they’ll pretend they care to get it out of you, and discard you once they’re done. But the way Shaddiq stares at him now– with eyes deep and gleaming like the tropic waters Elan has never seen himself, and thinks may no longer be there at all– it makes him go still and rigid in his seat.
No one looks at Elan Ceres in this way.
But the Peil Grade is never wrong in its judgment.
And somewhere in Elan’s mind, the paradox of the latter unravels the cold calculus of the former– and Shaddiq’s pushing the sugar bowl over; and with his palm upon its side, it’s less an offering and more like he’s asking Elan to take it.
–At the very least, he’s asking. Or maybe that’s what he wants Elan to think, but Elan doesn’t know if he cares any longer.
(Elan cares, of course. And he doesn’t. Because if he cares, then he might dare to have a preference. And then–)
Elan Ceres reaches for the sugar.
As he takes the bowl, their fingers brush, lazy and languid. Agreement and afterthought.
As if the both of them care not for it at all.