[He knew this was a possibility; he's . So he throws her a bone.
The next message is a short video file.
There he is. Dirk Strider. Looking... well, older. He always had an angular face, but the softness he was already losing as a teen is gone now, leaving him practically all angles around his big nose and heavy brows. Light brown skin marked with lighter, whiter lines where incidental injuries became incidental scars. There are a lot more of those.
He's got a little white-blond scruff on his chin, though whether that's habitual or just a side effect of a week spent travelling between towns is unclear.
His sunglasses look exactly the same, fit his face exactly the same.
He sets his mouth into a flat line the same, too, and carries his tension in his jaw the same. A perfect mask of control, hiding the shattered mess of razor-edged fragments he's holding together through sheer will just inches behind it. He could be about to break (he's not; he doesn't break), and far as she'd know, he's perfectly composed.]
Let's play a game. You take my call, I let you ask me a question. Any question. And assuming you don't ask me for Skaia's winning lotto numbers, I'll answer it. No strings attached, one hundred percent honesty. How's that sound to you?
[Pivoting to video is a calculated move on his part; show her his face, force her to see him as a person, make her look at the ways he's changed. The emotional appeal, the subconscious ties between seeing more of someone and thinking you have access to more of them, the false notion of intimacy.
His offer is also a calculated move. He doesn't even try to tug on her heartstrings; whatever heart she has is ruled by her head. Jane wants answers. He has most of them, if not literally all of them. And none of the questions she could ask him are worth playing coy about.]
[Video]
The next message is a short video file.
There he is. Dirk Strider. Looking... well, older. He always had an angular face, but the softness he was already losing as a teen is gone now, leaving him practically all angles around his big nose and heavy brows. Light brown skin marked with lighter, whiter lines where incidental injuries became incidental scars. There are a lot more of those.
He's got a little white-blond scruff on his chin, though whether that's habitual or just a side effect of a week spent travelling between towns is unclear.
His sunglasses look exactly the same, fit his face exactly the same.
He sets his mouth into a flat line the same, too, and carries his tension in his jaw the same. A perfect mask of control, hiding the shattered mess of razor-edged fragments he's holding together through sheer will just inches behind it. He could be about to break (he's not; he doesn't break), and far as she'd know, he's perfectly composed.]
Let's play a game. You take my call, I let you ask me a question. Any question. And assuming you don't ask me for Skaia's winning lotto numbers, I'll answer it. No strings attached, one hundred percent honesty. How's that sound to you?
[Pivoting to video is a calculated move on his part; show her his face, force her to see him as a person, make her look at the ways he's changed. The emotional appeal, the subconscious ties between seeing more of someone and thinking you have access to more of them, the false notion of intimacy.
His offer is also a calculated move. He doesn't even try to tug on her heartstrings; whatever heart she has is ruled by her head. Jane wants answers. He has most of them, if not literally all of them. And none of the questions she could ask him are worth playing coy about.]