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“So, what is it that you like to do for fun?” Dr. Christoff asked, his voice echoing slightly against the metallic walls of the stairway he found himself in.
“...What?” Hank returned Jeb’s question with one of his own, not understanding why he was asking, or what the point is.
“Must I always repeat myself with you?” Annoyance bit at Jeb’s tone, before he steeled himself, taking a deep breath. “I just mean it will be a while before we reach the Mining Sector this way. I thought perhaps we could have a conversation as we walk together, considering there is not much else to do at the present moment.”
“So basically, you’re bored.” Hank said, flatly. He hated how Jeb seemingly took twice as long to say anything than anyone else did. He always had to throw in so many extra words.
“Perhaps.” Jeb admitted. “Yet, you still have not answered my query, so I will ask again. What is it that you like to do for fun? Other than your...Usual activities, I mean.”
Hank let out a low, grumbling sigh as Jeb repeated his question. He really wasn’t in the mood for small talk, but for once the old geezer was right. There wasn’t anything to do, and the lack of action was making him twitchy. Hank pondered the question for a moment, before landing on an innocuous answer.
“Volleyball.” Hank stated.
“Hm...” Jeb reached a hand to his chin and stroked his beard. “Interesting. Did you play often?” Jeb paid Hank a cursory glance through the dark tints of his sunglasses, noticing that Hank wasn’t looking back at him, his gaze focused on the stairs ahead of them.
“Not really.”
“Would you have liked to?”
“...I guess?” Hank didn’t really know how to answer that question. He didn’t care about volleyball anymore, he was honestly somewhat surprised he even remembered liking it at some point. This entire conversation was seeming more and more pointless by the second.
“Then how about this?” Jeb stopped in his tracks for a moment, partially blocking Hank’s way with his body as he did. Hank fought the urge to clonk him one on the head right then and there, mostly because he was fairly certain Jeb would dodge or block it if he tried. “Once this is over, you and me, we’ll go out and have a game.”
“Can you move?” Hank shoved past Christoff on the stairs, bashing his shoulder as he did to get him out of the way. Jeb grit his teeth in response, fighting back yet another accusatory and mean spirited reply. He simply continued walking behind Hank instead.
“Well, what do you say?” Jeb insisted, noting Hank, again, did not answer his question.
“Where would we even play at?” Hank entertained Jeb’s offer for just a moment, if anything just to see where he’s going with this. Somehow, Hank felt that Christoff was after something other than a simple game of volleyball.
“Well, let’s see,” Jeb pondered, stroking his beard more as he did so. “I suppose we could use the basketball court in the outskirts of the city. I’m certain we could use one of the many chain-link fences as a makeshift net. The area is crawling with bandits, sure, but it’s nothing you or I couldn’t handle.”
“Wow,” Hank breathed, stifling a groan in his ruined throat. “You’re actually serious about this.” Hank’s tone feigned surprise in place of bitter sarcasm.
“I’m just spit balling ideas.” Jeb waved a hand through the air as he spoke, as he had a tendency to do, unconsciously or not. “We don’t have to play sports, are there any other leisurely activities you enjoy?” Again with this question. If Hank could roll his eyes in a way that Christoff could see it, he’d have done so by now.
“Let’s cut the crap, Christoff.” Hank demanded, far past done with whatever game he was playing. “We were trying to kill each other an hour ago, now you’re asking if I want to play volleyball with you? Come on. What do you really want?”
Jeb simply signed, pinching the bridge of his glasses and taking a moment to rub his eyes beneath them. “You have always had a tendency to...See through me.” Jeb admitted to himself and to Hank, regrettably. He decided if he were to get anything out of the mass-murdering super soldier before him, he would have to reveal at least some of his own vulnerabilities too.
“Okay, and?” Hank clenched a single fist for a moment before releasing it. The tension he held in his hands alone could snap bones. “Get to the point.”
“I just mean to say that out of anyone I’ve ever met in Nevada, you are probably the most perceptive. Even more so than that Doc friend of yours,” Jeb’s words hung on the name ‘Doc’, one of which he spoke with a certain bitterness he usually reserved for Hank’s name. “I cannot lie to you, Hank Wimbleton, so I shall grant your request. I believe that, somewhere deep inside yourself, there is perhaps more to you than the murderer I have come to know.”
“What exactly are you trying to say, old man?” For the first time in the conversation, Hank whipped his head around to meet Christoff’s gaze, which sat intently on Hank’s goggles. The both of them stopped walking as they did, and the cold air of the stairway hung still around them. Just when Hank was about to demand Jeb spit it out, he began to speak once more.
“Surely, somewhere within you there must be a normal person, am I wrong?” Usually in intense conversations like this, Christoff would thumb the hammer of his revolver, or run a finger across the broad end of his blade. Not wanting to brandish any weapons at a time like this, he simply settled for smoothing a thumb across his knuckles. Back and forth, back and forth. “Before all of this you must have been at least somewhat normal, a person with thoughts, dreams, aspirations, goals. You weren’t always like this.”
“If this is you trying to make a joke, then you’re out of your depth.” Hank turned his head around and kept walking down the stairs.
“Please, just listen to me, Hank.” Hank’s own name in Jeb’s voice sounded strange in this context. For as long as he could remember, he had always spoken his name with a deep, vitriolic hatred, as if Hank’s own name was some sort of terrible curse, but here he said it...Normally.
“I don’t really have much of a choice.” Hank growled beneath his mask.
“I only mean to say that maybe I was wrong about you.” Jeb swallowed his pride as he spoke, should it threaten to burst out of him again and undo any progress he had made, however little. “I understand that over the years we have known one another, I have called you many terrible things. A murderer, most of all. I do not retract or regret these statements as you have not denied them, but I have thought that perhaps you are capable of more than just wanton violence.”
“So what if I am, what if I’m not, what difference does it make?” Hank turned a corner on the flight of stairs, causing Christoff to catch a brief glimpse of the floor number as he turned with them. Twelve. Only a dozen flights left before they reached the Mining Sector, not much time left to speak before they were met once again with all manner of villainy to purge.
“Surely this isn’t all you want your life to be, Hank. Surely you wish there was more you could do in this world than chaotic violence and pointless murder. There must be something, some level of doubt, some level on introspection. Tell me, do you ever second guess yourself?”
“Oh, that is rich coming from you.” Hank spat. If this is the game Christoff wanted to play then sure, why the Hell not?
Jeb merely sighed. He was going to have to explain this. Again. “I am well aware that I have done some terrible things, Hank. I do not need you to remind me of that, all I can do is assure you that I have done so for good reasons. I did what had to be done, for the betterment of all of us. Do you know what would have happened if I did not stop Phobos?”
“Tell that to all the Zeds in the Residential sector, then. I’ve seen your handiwork, Christoff, and it’s not pretty. I might be a killer, but you destroyed an entire city. You still have that over me.”
“I did what was necessary,” Jeb said again, through gritted teeth. “No matter. We shall speak no more of this. Clearly, we are not getting anywhere.”
“Finally.” Hank felt relief, for a moment, but knew this probably wasn’t over. The thing about Christoff is that when he set his mind to something, no matter how pointless, he would follow through on it to the best of his ability. What silence between them there was wouldn’t last much longer.
“Just one more thing,” Jeb piped up again. “What of your allies, the ones you entered the city with?”
Great, Hank said in his head. Here we go again. “What about them?”
“Who are they?” Jeb glanced at the floor number again. Eight, this time.
“Why do you care?”
“Well, I’d like to know who I’m meeting with. We are headed to the Science Tower to regroup with them, are we not?”
“Fine.” Hank conceded. “I dunno, really. Couple of Doc’s boys. He never told me where he found them, just that they work for him. Assuming they didn’t die on the way there, they should already be at the Tower by now.”
“And their names are…?” Jeb inquired, hiking up a brow beneath his sunglasses.
“Dunno. Never asked.”
Jeb’s mind went blank for a moment. “You’re telling me that you agreed to go on a dangerous mission with these men and you never bothered to learn their names?”
“Yep.”
“Right.” Jeb rubbed his hand across his forehead in exasperation. “Even your allies, ones you have presumably fought alongside before, you don’t care about them at all?”
“Why should I? All that matters is they’re not the ones shooting at me.”
“And if that were to change?”
“Then I take them out.” Hank’s voice was cold and matter of fact, barely a hint of emotion behind his words. Jeb winced internally at the comment, his resolve in his endeavor to get through to Hank wavering. Before Jeb could form a rebuttal, however, Hank’s voice sounded again.
“I’m gonna go on ahead. I’m tired of talking about this.” As abruptly as the conversation had begun, it ended. Hank sped down the remaining flights of stairs, not so much as stopping to look behind him. Jeb’s own movements slowed to a near halt, lazily putting one foot in front of the other, his mind deep in thought. Before he knew it, he had come to a complete stop.
“That usually works.” Jeb thought aloud, now with no one to listen to him. A hint of surprise but mostly disappointment clouded his words. Oh well, he thought to himself, shrugging off the interaction. If anything, he had proven to himself things he already knew. In usual fashion, he had been correct the entire time. Hank Wimbleton was an irredeemable monster, far beyond redemption. He would have to be dealt with sooner or later, but for now, the mission priority was to destroy the last remaining remnants of Project Nexus, and begin it anew, as it was originally intended to function.
Jeb scanned his surroundings, his eyes landing on a window nearby. Slowly, he began to raise off the ground, levitating up to the window. Through it, he could see a maintenance hatch. If his memory of the city’s schematics was correct, it would lead him somewhere above where Hank and his cohorts would be meeting.
May as well make an entrance, Jeb thought. He always did have a flair for the dramatics. With that in mind, he shattered the window with a quick bash of his revolver’s hilt, and set himself up to descend upon the trio.