Want a light?

The worst part about being a legionnaire, Lez had long ago decided, was that you became a small, insignificant little screw in a huge mechanism that you were never going to fully understand. Sure, the little screws may hold the thing together, but it somehow lost its identity in the larger scope of things. It was a screw, but now it was one screw that was part of one giant machine that could go on without that particular tiny piece. Of course, the screw didn't really mind that its one purpose in life was to aid a huge contraption; it didn't really have a mind to begin with.

Lez, however, did have a mind, and, contrary to what some might think, she often used it. It wasn't that she was particularly bothered by being part of something bigger, but she sometimes felt as though she had lost something. Individuality, maybe. She wasn't quite sure; philosophizing was something she didn't tend to do a lot since it often left her in a bad mood, which made her want a smoke even more so than usual.

There wasn't a specific person or thing she was pissed at, just....well, she just wasn't in the best mindset at the moment. She took long drag from her cigarette, holding the smoke in her lungs. Sometimes, she wondered if she was cut out for the Legion--well, more like if the Legion was cut out for her. Sometimes, it felt as though the authorities higher than herself were purposefully trying to make her life hell. Give them an inch, she thought darkly to herself, and they'll beat you with that inch within a fucking inch of your life. Not all of them were that bad, though. Her two Centurions, Christian and Corinne, were actually decent human beings, and some of the other Centurions weren't complete asshats, either.

As she exhaled and watched the smoke exit her mouth, she heard the tell-tale sound of someone climbing the aqueduct. She looked over the side to see Cliff's shaggy head. "It's 'bout time you fuckin' showed up, Masterson," she hollered down at him, smirking a bit.

Cliff had finished his tasks as a legionnaire that day. He had spent countless hours working on poise drills, fight strategies and learning some survival skills that would be needed for a quest or combat mission. Maybe in a year or so Cliff would be able to make optio if he worked hard, he knew soon Lauren might retire and there may be a spot open, but there were so many others in the cohort that would be good for the role. Part of the legacy had always desired to be part of something more and bigger than what he had now, but he'd always be content with what he had. Anything was better than the dump he was in before this.

He had started to make his way over to the aqueduct, it was where a few of the demigods hung out from time to time, mostly for various parties that they had, but Cliff wasn't always a huge people person unless someone had asked him to be there.

As he began to climb up he heard the words from Lez. She was a girl from his cohort that he had met awhile ago. They ended up sharing a hobby in common and from there they'd sometimes talk during their smoke breaks about various different things, most times they were just trivial things, but every now and then they dabbled into other conversation topics. Once at the top he sat down on the ledge and pulled his pack out of his pocket grabbing the cigarette and his metal lighter.

As he lit his cigarette he held it between his pointer finger and middle finger bringing the the butt end of it up to his lips before inhaling the smoke and holding it for a minute before exhaling and looking over to Lez, "Sorry, didn't know I had a curfew." He joked to her with a smirk on his face now, "So, what's new and fascinating in the life of Lez?" He asked curiously.

"What would we Romans be without our rules and curfews?" she snorted, only half-jokingly. Oftentimes the Legion could feel so constricting and overwhelming with its intensity. Lez had never really been into letting people order her around like that before she had come here, and she still wasn't the biggest fan. Still, she figured it was a better alternative than getting attacked by monsters all of the time. Or living with her mother. Well, anything was better than living with that bitch.

She took a long drag from her cigarette before answering his question. "Oh, the usual," she replied nonchalantly, shrugging her shoulders a bit. "Trainin' to kill shit and tryin' not to step on the toes of those fuckin' dickheads. I tell you what, Cliff, if those sticks in their asses were stuck up any further, we'd have half a Legion of motherfuckin' shish kabobs." She didn't get why some of these kids were so unbelievably proud of which deity fucked their parents or some shit like that. It's not like they had anything to do with it. Then kids like her get cast aside like some unwanted doll because their heritage wasn't as desirable. So what if your dad had a planet lacking lifeforms named after him, or if your mother was practically married to war? Lez really couldn't see why that made them better than genuinely good people like Christian, or Corinne, or even Cliff. Fuckin' war machines and their fuckin' unhealthy obsession with killing things.

"What's goin' on with you? Still with that one girl?" asked Lez as she let some fumes escape through her nostrils.

"Greeks." Cliff said answering the blonde's questions in regards to their rules and curfews. It was no secret that the Romans were far more organized and strict than the Greeks, that they had a sense of order. There were a lot of times where the legacy had to wonder how many Romans would thrive in a Greek environment more and vice versa, sadly it didn't matter because if you were Roman you were in camp Jupiter and if you were a Greek you were in Camp Half-Blood.

He nodded and gave a few 'uh huhs' in there when she began to explain what was going on with her life recently but couldn't help the snort that came out as she mentioned some of the legion walking with sticks up their ass. "You know my thoughts on the current centurions besides our own, so you know some of my views align with yours." With that he flicked the ashes off of his cigarette before bringing it up to his mouth and having his lips surround the butt of the cigarette as in he sucked back the smoke into his body before letting it out in a long steady stream of smoke, it really was a good stress reliever.

"Going on a quest soon with Christian and Lennie, I'm a little excited for it, but still have my nerves about it, not sure how it'll go being out in the world again, but only time will tell." Cliff ran his fingers through his mop of a hair slightly as he looked over to her to answer her question about 'that one girl' "Yeah, of course. Melanie and I are going strong still. Been dating her for two years now, slight pain in my butt here and there, but what girl isn't?"

Lez couldn't help but chuckle at Cliff's answer. "True," she said, smirking a bit. In a way, she sort of admired the freedom and disorganization of the Greek demigods. Sure, it definitely wasn't anywhere near as effective as the order and structure of the Legion, but....there were times when she wondered about what would happen if both factions of demigods could somehow meet in the middle with their different ways of life. A bit of the Legion's order, a bit of Camp Half-Blood's individuality.... Probably wouldn't work, she thought as she sucked on the butt of her cigarette. They're way too different. Happy mediums are fairy tales. Still, it was a nice dream, but merely a silly dream that would never work; she had a feeling that neither faction would want to cooperate to create something as absurd of what she was thinking about.

She nodded in agreement. "It's always nice to know somebody else has half a goddamn brain 'round here," she said as she released some of the cancerous vapor from her lungs, only half-joking. Lez was normally pretty good at ignoring the other human beings she encountered throughout the day, but sometimes....well, she was just glad that people like Cliff existed: they were intelligent, didn't ramble on about "the glory of New Rome," knew the value of an individual person, and smoked. Those kinds of people, give or take a few traits here and there, were the only ones Lez would consider friends.

Her attention was peaked a bit when Cliff mentioned going on a quest. "Oh really?" she asked, glancing over at him. "A quest? Sounds good." Lez never really went on quests; prophecies and whatnot seemed to think she wasn't suited for that kind of thing, which she agreed with. "Look, I'm probably not the best at givin' advice when it comes to this sort of shit, but trust me on this when I say you'll be fine. Well, that's not sayin' a Cyclops won't come after you because let's be honest, one probably will." Her lip upturned at that last part, but she was serious about it. "I mean about the part where you have to deal with those dumbasses who work at McDonald's, or people who drive twenty miles below the speed limit. That shit's the hard part. But I think you'll do fine. Just keep your head outta your ass and you'll be good. Can't say the same for those two idiots," she placed emphasis on the last word, which she viewed more as a term of endearment than an insult, "but it'll work out. Probably. Unless the Fates decide to be bitches about it."

Lez went ahead and laughed at his comment about girls. "If I wasn't a teetotaler and we had booze, I'd drink to that," she told him. She had always viewed herself as "one that occasionally dabbles" when it came to relationships, so she's had her share--both girls and boys. "You've got a good one, though. I think. I mean, she is the brains in your relationship, right?" she teased.

Cliff nodded in agreement to when she mentioned at least someone had half a brain. He wouldn't say Roman's were dumb, but a few were huge sticklers for the rules and often times some got giant heads about themselves and thought they were so great. The legacy could almost see the cohorts and the legion in general almost being a form of high school, people who were somebody were usually those who had wealth and status or knew people and had connections. They were the type of people who grew up thinking their own shit didn't stink and they got handed everything on silver platter with their silver spoon. In some regards Cliff would kill for the taste of that kind of life, but he knew he wouldn't be where he is today if it weren't for it.

"Yeah." He replied to her about the quest. He brought the cigarette butt back up to his lips which they curled around and from there he sucked back the grey cloud of smoke before letting it come out in little circle O's before he looked back over to the blonde, "Well, it's just going out there means I might have to face some old demons, stuff I don't like to get into or talk about a lot. Part of me wonders if on the way back home, if I'll try to go see my mom. I'm not sure if they've given her death row yet or not, I haven't spoken to her in years it's hard to say, but part of me feels like I need answers." Cliff said weighing in on quite the heavy subject. It was stuff like this that usually kept him up at night and was why he needed to go out to the lake or the Little Tiber to just soothe his soul from his past.

Part of him always wondered what his mother was up to and how she was. He wanted to know more about why she did what she did, why she just killed his father with no hesitation. None of it made sense to him and they were the answers he had wanted for so long, but felt like he could never get them, but maybe somehow with this quest and returning home he could. There was also the possibility of speaking with a kid who could channel his father's spirit or something, but Cliff didn't want to disturb his rest, he had already been through enough.

Cliff chuckled a bit as his fingers returned to sliding through his messy hair again. "You got that one right. She doesn't fit the exact mold of a child of Mercury, but she definitely has the brains. I'm surprised she hasn't gotten higher in the ranks sometimes, but I think she's happy just being a legionnaire and any title and job would probably stress her out more than she is now." He said with a shrug of his shoulders.

Lez took another drag of her cigarette, feeling the butt warm slightly under her fingertips. The one bad thing about her smoking was that she didn't take it slowly and could finish five in the amount of time most would finish one. She mentally chided herself to take it easy as she exhaled the fumes.

She nodded understandingly at his comments on his old life. "We don't have to talk 'bout it if you don't want to," she told him. With almost anyone else and with almost any other subject, she might've pushed. However, Cliff was one of the small handful of people she could count as a friend in the Legion, and she didn't especially like to piss her friends off. When he spoke about wanting answers, Lez couldn't help but feel a twinge of sympathy. Pity? No, she never pitied anyone, but she sympathized with Cliff's situation even if she couldn't fully understand the magnitude of it. "We all want answers for somethin'," she offered, "but you've always gotta be prepared to not get one, if you know what I mean. There's not always a reason for what happens: it just does."

Lez had never been to the Underworld before, but she had been around enough dead people to have picked up on a few things about the worst of human nature. She knew that what sometimes felt like a justified reason to pull the trigger at one moment could be void the next. People tend to act rashly when emotional, and sometimes bad things happen. As much as she hated to think like that, she knew that it wouldn't do any good to ask her mother why she drank and acted the way she did, but there was a stupid part of her--an irrational part--that always hoped that the bitch had had some legitimate reason for being the way she was. Maybe Cliff would get the answers he was looking for.

She smirked a bit at his comment about Melanie. Lez wasn't half as good with living people as she was with the dead, so she always liked to see it whenever a person and another person got along with each other the way Cliff and his girlfriend did. While she had never felt for another person in that way, she couldn't help but smile whenever other people did. "Gods, I'm tryin' to imagine her in a room filled with Davenports'n it's fuckin' crackin' me up," she snorted as she flicked the butt of her cigarette and crushed it beneath her shoe. So much for slowing down and making it last.