OOM: Room 6620

[the_gene_genie]

He's never really been one for sitting alone with his thoughts - to be honest, there aren't that many occasions that call for it. He tends to be confident in his actions and decisions and give little mind to his failings or mistakes.

This mood that Saffron put him in though, is actually more normal. And he'd defy any copper to deny they felt the same way, at times. It's a thankless job they do and a never ending one as well. Everyone copes with it in different ways. Gene's way, tonight, is to drink and then drink some more, shifting around the room as various parts of his body complain from his recent excursions.

Comments

[lady_bols]

A key fumbles in the lock, and there's a dull thud at the door.

A woman's voice mutters intently, her words slurred, and it's obvious she's speaking to herself.

"I've never figured out how he can get three sheets to the wind and manage not just the flight of steps but the door to my flat without even stumbling, much less dropping his keys. Anyway, it's not his flat. It's just a --"

She freezes in her tracks when she sees the room is occupied.

"Gene?"

It can't be. She left him in CID just before she came through to the bar. Unless he slipped passed her somehow. She squints in the half light, trying to focus on his features.

[the_gene_genie]

'...yeah?'

He's standing, bending backwards slightly to stretch his back out, a glass of Scotch in one hand and a fag in the other. He doesn't have shoes on and his tie and jacket are slung messily over a chair; the tan camelhair overcoat is hanging on a coatrack in the corner. He sort of looks a tousled mess, clearly a bloke that wasn't expecting company and had shuttered in for the night.

'Who're...oh, it's you.'

'...why've you got a key to my room?'

[lady_bols]

He must have slipped passed her. She's forgotten he's not the only him that comes to the bar.

She's half way into the room, slipping out of her white leather jacket and slinging it over his coat without even looking at him. She wobbles a bit on her heels, chattering away.

"Because you gave it to me. Rather, I kept it after the last time. I got into this discussion, this really absorbing discussion with -- someone," she waves a vague hand back over her shoulder, "about the nature of the physics of this place and standing temporal distortions and whatnot."

Long fingers drag her dark curls up off her neck as she unclips the heavy red coral necklace, slipping it into the pocket of her jacket. "Anyway, we finished off a bottle of that good Rioja and I just wanted to have a kip before I went back to the office. You don't mind do you?"

[the_gene_genie]

Gene blinks.

'You're plannin' on gettin' your kit off an' climbin' into my bed?

...no, I don' mind.'

Crap, what's her name?

Drake. Alex Drake. That's right, he thinks.

[lady_bols]

She scoffs, waves a hand at him. "Yeah, you go right on dreaming."

Though she does totter over to the bed and sit down heavily, falling back, arms sprawled over her head.

"I've had too much to drink, that's all. I just -- want to take my boots off and have a lie down. I promise, I'll be -- quiet as a mouse."

If mice were prone to nattering on when they're drunk, that is. She'll sit up and take her boots off in a moment.

[the_gene_genie]

'Is tha' goin' to start any time soon? The 'quiet as a mouse' thing?'

He walks to a chair and sits heavily, putting his glass on the table.

'I gave you my key after the last time of what?'

She's obviously thinking of his future self and he could tell her that, but why waste the opportunity to dig a little bit?

[lady_bols]

She doesn't even bother to sit up, just talks to the ceiling.

"Oh like you have room to talk. You're a right mouthy bastard when you want to be. Last time was after Ace and I lugged your utterly unconscious arse up those stairs and I stayed the night to make sure you didn't choke on your own 'sparko'." She throws up big air quotes around one of his favourite words.

"You should remember, you bought me breakfast. Even brought me a spoon."

Her voice rises at the end of that phrase, like she thought it was the sweetest thing he'd ever done for her. (It was, come to think of it.)

[the_gene_genie]

'Did I?'

Bloody hell. Does he turn into a girl in the next eight years?

'Listen sweet'eart, I think you shoul' know...I 'aven't been sparko in me own sick since National Service an' I'm pretty sure I wouldn' need a bird around t'hold my hand even if the inclination did take me.'

[lady_bols]

Little gears are grinding in Alex's quite lubricated head. She rolls her head to one side to look at him. Looks like Gene to her.

"Maybe you should really stay away from that Atlantean wine, if it makes you forget not only the night of, but the morning after. I could have pulled a Jackie McQueen on you and you'd be none the wiser."

She mutters to herself in a really bad Scottish accent, "'I 'ad to tie a pencil to it.' As if."

[the_gene_genie]

...she is pissed. Unless those bruises on his head really are masking something deeper and he's just imagining all the bollocks coming out of her pie-hole.

'Jackie Queen? 'ow the bloody 'ell do you know Jackie Queen?'

It hasn't escaped him that this woman is talking about him and sex in the same sentence.

'An' f'your information, Gene Hunt does not drink wine. Any wine.'

[lady_bols]

"She came down -- to London town," she murmurs, the truth of the situation slowly unfolding in her head. She takes a deep breath, every muscle in her body tensing as she rolls to one side, looking at him.

"Oh God."

[the_gene_genie]

Gene just looks back at her. And after a moment, waves.

'Hello.'

[lady_bols]

"You're not my Gene. You're Sam's Gene."

She shuffles awkwardly to sit up on the bed, blinking, one hand over her mouth, and truth be told, it's as much to stem the rising tide of hysterical laughter as it is to hide her grimace of mortification.

"What year?" The question tumbles out of her mouth before she can catch it.

[the_gene_genie]

'1973, luv.'

He says it wearily, like he's sick of being asked this all the time. He isn't. He's just sick of the reaction it normally garners and is expecting more of the same from her.

'An' the Gene Genie don' belong to no one bu' the Gene Genie.'

Just so she knows.

'What year're you from?'

[lady_bols]

Well, that sentiment sets her back on her heels. (Does her Gene think that way? Would he baulk so blatantly if she called him hers?) She swallows hard, blinking for a moment.

"1982."

She should get up right now and leave. She should just -- to hell with sleeping it off. She can get her own room.

She doesn't move.

[the_gene_genie]

'Right.'

He sits and looks at her squarely, the way he does when he's facing a suspect over the table in the Lost and Found. Just sort of waiting for them to speak and give him an excuse to explode. Not that he's planning on exploding at her but she can't deny, this is awkward.

'Well. I was jus' sittin' up here ponderin' existence an' the like but I suppose I could put that aside for a few minutes. Want a drink?'

[lady_bols]

It'd be a hell of a lot more awkward if she wasn't already over the legal limit. But as she is, she figures, why the hell not?

Her chin drops and she looks at him. Her voice takes on a stern Manc accent. "Gene Hunt does not ponder his existence." Her own plummy tones return. "He drinks himself into oblivion. And since I'm already half way there..."

She toes her boots off, thinking all the while, does this send the wrong message? Do I even care at this point?

[the_gene_genie]

'Oh, of course. Thanks for the reminder.'

It was, sort of, what he'd been doing. But he's hardly going to admit it for real and anyway, he was also drinking himself into oblivion. It's the more fun option anyway and she seems good enough company. So he pours her a measure and gets up slowly to hand it over, moving stiffly though he tries to mask it.

'There y'are.' He looks down on her a moment, taking in her face, then moves back to his chair.

'You seem t'know me pretty well.'

[lady_bols]

The stiffness of his movements is enough to spark something in her chest. A fierce protectiveness edges into her voice. "I know you well enough to know you're hurt. What on earth did you do?"

She takes the glass and sets it aside, moving to follow him.

[the_gene_genie]

His eyebrows go up as she bears down on him, surprised more than alarmed.

'Went an' fought some mutants with a kid from here, an' a few others. There was a small atomic blast. S'alright though, jus' a few bruises an' a burn.'

He'd tell her not to fuss but he's been drinking steadily himself for a while now and, while not drunk, is relaxed enough to not want to rile himself up.

'Sit down, you're pissed.'

[lady_bols]

"A small atomic blast!?" She puts a finger under his chin and tips his face up to the light, hissing under her breath as she sees the nasty purple mottling running along his left temple down to his cheek. "Good Lord have mercy."

She doesn't seem nearly as pissed as she stalks away. "Don't move." She grabs the ice bucket off the side board, and reaches into the tiny trash can to steal a fresh bin liner. She's muttering under her breath as she moves. "Betty will have my hide if you go home looking like that."

She turns to fix him with a look (Alex is a mother; she's perfected that look) and disappears out the door to look for the ice machine. She's only gone a few minutes.

[the_gene_genie]

He's about to insist she doesn't fuss but then she mentions that name. He's surprised beyond words for a beat or two and only manages to call out - sounding quite pissed off, it has to be said - as she's leaving the room;

'Oi!

...how d'you know my mam?!'

[lady_bols]

Oh like she's never heard that tone before, honestly. She finds a towel cabinet on her way back from the ice machine and snags a couple of the softest flannels she can find.

And then she's back, her face set with a resolute determination. "Keep your voice down. I think they heard you in Outer Mongolia." She bundles some ice into the bin liner and wraps it in a flannel. "Put your chin up. And before you roar again, you introduced me to her. You showed up at my door on Christmas Eve, told me to throw a nice frock and some clean knickers in a bag, that we were off to Manchester for the duration."

[the_gene_genie]

'Bollocks,' he says, his face just as resolutely determined.

It has to be bollocks. He pulls his head back, away from her ministrations.

'Stop fussin', woman, I ain't a ponce. An' then tell me why I'd ask you to spend Christmas wi' me.'

His expression turns suspicious.

'Are we shaggin'? You feelin' the magic brush of th' Gene Genie's wand, eh?'

[lady_bols]

She scoffs again. Sam didn't exaggerate much, did he? "You're not a ponce but neither are you bulletproof. And if you don't ice that ruddy thick slab of granite you call a skull, my guess is that it'll take twice as long to heal. You'll go stir crazy long before then, staring at these four walls, waiting to go back, and if you go back before it's healed, you'll have no reasonable explanation for such severe injuries."

That said, and the ice pack reapplied to the side of his face, her tone gentles somewhat. "You took me to Manchester because you didn't want me to spend Christmas alone, and because I'm your DI, you felt -- well, I don't know what you felt, honestly. But it was a lovely holiday, and your mum is a fantastic cook."

There's a genuine affection in her voice for Betty, and she blinks several times, looking back to the glass he poured for her. She drifts away from him, back to the drink which disappears in a few long swallows.