"Afraid your pizza boxes gonna go necro?" It's a stupid joke. Everyone has incinerators, up this way. It's just smart business, not leaving trash lying around. In the cities you can take your stuff to dumpsters and they'll incinerate for you but out here? You're on your own.
Sam takes the boxes Higgs is holding and heads up to go incinerate them. Muttering to himself about what a dumb joke he made.
The joke is so ridiculous it pulls a laugh from Higgs before he can stop himself. It's a genuine one, too, by how short and startled it is, even if he does straighten up abruptly in an attempt to make himself look a little more serious.
"I didn't know you had a sense of humor, Bridges."
Well, at least it made Higgs laugh. Sam smiles and ducks his head, the tips of his ears turning a little red.
"It's my best kept secret." Or at least, a secret between him and the security cameras in all the private rooms he stayed. Somewhere he's sure there's footage of him making faces in the mirror, or taking stupid selfies. Flexing for whoever watches the cameras. It relieves boredom for a few minutes, anyway.
"You got any other interesting secrets?" It's teasing more than a real question, friendly banter he's not even aware of doing.
"You've always struck me as the broody, serious type. Doesn't speak much at all unless there's a very good reason." Versus Higgs, who... well, when he talks he does talk a lot, but he's not exactly the chatty person he was under the Extinction Entity's influence.
Porters are often off in their own heads. Maybe that's why so many of them these days travel in small groups. It's less lonely that way, even if it does slow down deliveries. "I wouldn't know what questions to ask," he says with a shrug. He frowns right after, though. Maybe that's a little too harsh a way to put it. "What I mean is... I don't really... talk to folks much. I'm better at writing letters."
"Huh," Higgs says. It's filler, a noise indicating he's still present even if he's struggling to come up with something to talk about. "Well... you know what my favorite food is. So what's yours?"
It's an innocent question, as far as he's concerned. No way to have it turn into a conversation about something incredibly unpleasant.
"Most of the time, if I'm craving something, it's a really good piece of meat. Burger, steak, whatever. Something I can really sink my teeth into, you know?" It feels like a boring answer, but at least they're talking.
It may be a boring answer to Sam, but at the very least Higgs looks interested. "We could always order burgers, you know. Get a huge order out here. Peter Englert was orderin' food often enough no one would suspect anything. Well, I suppose it not bein' pizza might be a little odd but it ain't like most people are paying attention to that."
Higgs hadn't gone to great efforts to disguise himself at all, but it seemed like Bridges were a little too occupied to notice the obvious hints. "What do you have in that canteen you're always drinking from?"
For a second his brow furrows, wondering how Higgs knows about his canteen. But then he remembers what exactly is on the wall behind him and it clicks back into place. "Oh, uh. It's an energy drink. A Monster. Helps keep my stamina up.
And I wouldn't mind ordering burgers, some time. Even if you're more of a ham sort of guy."
Even when he's being friendly, the fact that Higgs had some.... problems is more than obvious. "Sounds like a strange thing to keep in there, if you ask me. Sugary drinks are a diuretic." Leave it to Higgs to know random facts like that.
But as for the food... "I ain't that picky about what I eat, to tell the truth. So it shouldn't be an issue."
"Can't say I have," Higgs admits. He doesn't refuse the can, though, taking it in his hand. "I've never seen any drink like this before. Nothin' like it out West."
He cracks open the can, takes a sip and pulls a face. "Christ, what the hell is in this?" But Higgs isn't the sort of person to waste food, so after a moment he takes another drink.
Sam has to laugh at that, shaking his head a little and reaching his hand out to take the can back. "I'll drink it, if you don't like it. It's definitely an acquired taste."
Higgs shakes his head, smiling a little as he pulls the can out of Sam's reach. "I ain't gonna waste food given to me." Sure, it's technically a drink, but his point remains.
Which isn't quite fair, given how much taller Higgs is than Sam. With his long goddamn arms. Sam isn't short, he's a perfectly fine height. Higgs is just huge. Like Heartman.
"Of course. I don't take kindly to folks who waste food."
He says it playfully, but there is a serious note to it. It's probably not much of a surprise that a man who was out on his own as a child grew up without much food at all. Maybe it helps explain how thin he is, even now.
"Well I promise I don't waste food, either." Which is why he was going to finish off the drink for Higgs. But Higgs is nothing if not stubborn, he's learned that much.
"'Course it was!" Higgs exclaims. "It would have been a crime to waste those ingredients. Especially considerin' they were all made fresh to order. Ain't nothing like hot pizza, you know. Probably my favorite dish."
...not much of a surprise, given the state of his shelter up until a couple minutes ago.
"And delivered within your time limits," he points out, a little proudly. He worked hard to be The Great Deliverer, and whatever other names people have chosen to bestow upon him.
"Of course you did." It's exactly the sort of thing he expected of Sam; he wouldn't have ordered repeatedly from him otherwise.
...Well. Actually he probably would have.
As for the question, he can't help relaxing a little at it. "All the time. Got some ridiculous requests, especially from the preppers who didn't trust people at all. But if you did well on those ones, you won them over."
"I've gotten a few of those. The trust-building deliveries. Bring me my camera, or my toolbox -- or my girlfriend. And then we'll see if I can trust you.
Never made sense to me. If you trust me enough to go get something that important to you, then trust me the rest of the way."
"It's a pretty good story, yeah." Sam debates for a moment, but... no one ever asks him about work. They just pat him on the head and send him on the next delivery.
So he tells Higgs the story of the Junk Dealer and the Chiral Artist. How it really didn't matter, to him, if the the Junk Dealer joined the UCA or not, what really mattered was that his girlfriend was alive, and Sam was going to find her, hell or high water.
"And I did. And she asked to be brought back to him, so I did that too. Brought them back together."
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Sam takes the boxes Higgs is holding and heads up to go incinerate them. Muttering to himself about what a dumb joke he made.
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"I didn't know you had a sense of humor, Bridges."
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"It's my best kept secret." Or at least, a secret between him and the security cameras in all the private rooms he stayed. Somewhere he's sure there's footage of him making faces in the mirror, or taking stupid selfies. Flexing for whoever watches the cameras. It relieves boredom for a few minutes, anyway.
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"You've always struck me as the broody, serious type. Doesn't speak much at all unless there's a very good reason." Versus Higgs, who... well, when he talks he does talk a lot, but he's not exactly the chatty person he was under the Extinction Entity's influence.
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Sam shrugs and leans against the edge of the desk again. "You can ask me whatever. Like you said, I read your journal."
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Porters are often off in their own heads. Maybe that's why so many of them these days travel in small groups. It's less lonely that way, even if it does slow down deliveries. "I wouldn't know what questions to ask," he says with a shrug. He frowns right after, though. Maybe that's a little too harsh a way to put it. "What I mean is... I don't really... talk to folks much. I'm better at writing letters."
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What's something that I know about you, that you want to know about me?" he offers, by way of a potential conversation starter.
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It's an innocent question, as far as he's concerned. No way to have it turn into a conversation about something incredibly unpleasant.
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Higgs hadn't gone to great efforts to disguise himself at all, but it seemed like Bridges were a little too occupied to notice the obvious hints. "What do you have in that canteen you're always drinking from?"
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And I wouldn't mind ordering burgers, some time. Even if you're more of a ham sort of guy."
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But as for the food... "I ain't that picky about what I eat, to tell the truth. So it shouldn't be an issue."
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Not picky about what he eats. So the fancy ingredients had been just to poke at Sam a little. Amusing, in retrospect. Annoying at the time.
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He cracks open the can, takes a sip and pulls a face. "Christ, what the hell is in this?" But Higgs isn't the sort of person to waste food, so after a moment he takes another drink.
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"Even if you don't like the taste?"
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He says it playfully, but there is a serious note to it. It's probably not much of a surprise that a man who was out on his own as a child grew up without much food at all. Maybe it helps explain how thin he is, even now.
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"At least I know my pizza was put to good use."
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...not much of a surprise, given the state of his shelter up until a couple minutes ago.
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"You ever get orders like that, as a porter?"
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...Well. Actually he probably would have.
As for the question, he can't help relaxing a little at it. "All the time. Got some ridiculous requests, especially from the preppers who didn't trust people at all. But if you did well on those ones, you won them over."
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Never made sense to me. If you trust me enough to go get something that important to you, then trust me the rest of the way."
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Probably a good one, at that. "Can't say I have any delivery stories like that."
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So he tells Higgs the story of the Junk Dealer and the Chiral Artist. How it really didn't matter, to him, if the the Junk Dealer joined the UCA or not, what really mattered was that his girlfriend was alive, and Sam was going to find her, hell or high water.
"And I did. And she asked to be brought back to him, so I did that too. Brought them back together."
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