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Pavel didn’t have a lot of time with the Giant, all things considered. He didn’t exactly have time to stick around and chat - not unless he wanted to get arrested for real. Which he wasn’t too keen on. He needed to get out quick, but that was easier said than done. As it turned out, evading the cops was hard. Especially when there was no one else on the streets to blend into. And especially when one of them was a man roughly the size of a mountain sitting in the center of town with nothing better to do but watch his every move.
Unfortunately for the local law, Pavel was not one to be deterred. Sure, a guy with fingernails the size of his whole body may have been an effective deterrent for other, lesser folks, but a giant guy was still just a guy. And guys had such things as traits and tendencies, all things he could use to his advantage if he only had the grit to do so.
So no, he hadn’t spent long with the Giant, but you learn fast when the consequence for not doing so is going to jail. In the short time they’d been forced to tolerate each other, he’d learned quite a lot. Jotting down a list physically felt… weird, in a way, so instead he tried to keep a mental catalog to reference whenever a situation arose.
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The Giant was very receptive to flattery. That was something he’d found out rather quickly. He realized the last thing he wanted was to get on his warden’s bad side - it was best to keep him at least neutral for the time being.
Even in his first interactions with the man he’d found that he was pretty receptive to just about everything, be it good or bad. And something about that struck Pavel as… strange. Or something along those lines. Just like everyone else in town, Pavel had known about the Giant for a good while. It was impossible not to, unless you lived your entire life in a basement with zero contact to the outside world. Regardless, it had always been a distant sort of knowing. No matter how human the Giant looked or even acted, it was clear that he was considered an object, or something object-adjacent. One of contempt, at that.
Talking to him now, though, seeing the reactions to everything Pavel said, it was so much more personal. And Pavel couldn’t quite decide how he felt about that.
It was interesting, he decided. And it complicated things. But it was mostly just interesting.
In any case, the Giant was very receptive to flattery. But at the same time, he was oddly hesitant to truly accept it. There wasn’t the slightest hint of arrogance in his disposition, and at times he seemed uncertain. Uncertain what to do with himself, or with Pavel. Which was strange to think about. Above all, he looked utterly caught off guard. Considering no one in town ever had anything nice to say about him, Pavel supposed that made sense. It didn’t seem like he’d spoken to anyone in a while, much less had any positive interactions.
Pavel couldn’t say that everything he said to the Giant was true. Mostly because it wasn’t. But he had to admit, the way the giant smiled down at him - awkward, like the expression was unfamiliar to him - it made him almost wish that it was.
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Pavel had long assumed that the Giant wasn’t afraid of anything. Why would he be? If Pavel had been the size of the mountain with the wingspan of an entire town, he’d expect not to be afraid of anything. What could possibly hurt someone, something, like him?
Pavel was wrong. The Giant didn’t fear much, but fearing little was not the same as fearing nothing at all. And being big wasn’t the same as being invincible.
The Giant feared thunder.
Saying it like that might have been an oversimplification. A fear of thunder was something that most people probably associated with children, or pets. In those cases, the fear amounted to a fear of an unexpected loud noise that you didn’t understand. The Giant, though, was in neither of the above categories. But it made little difference, because it wasn’t truly the thunder that the Giant feared, but rather, what came with it. The Giant feared lightning.
To Pavel, lightning was a fascinating meteorological event that was always a treat to witness, with how rare and fleeting it tended to be. But when you were the biggest thing for dozens of miles, lightning clearly didn’t have the same awe-inspiring effect. Pavel had been fairly close to the Giant’s face a number of times, and he’d been quick to notice the marks peppering it. Little jagged dots with discolored roots spreading downward. Small, but far from invisible. Pavel wondered how many more there were that he couldn’t see.
Knowing what they represented, he had to cringe when he thought about how close some of them were to the Giant’s eyes.
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Come his third day of being shunned by everyone in town, Pavel was, admittedly, not doing so well. He was exhausted in every way a person could be, and he’d barely eaten anything for… too long. He didn’t have access to a mirror, but with how he felt at the present moment, maybe that was for the best. Nonetheless, he had stuff to do, and he wasn’t about to let off-kilter homeostasis get in the way.
Apparently, the Giant had other ideas.
He - fairly, he’d say - assumed the Militisioner wouldn’t care. Or rather, it didn’t even cross his mind what the Giant would feel in this situation, because every sense he had told him that it was insignificant. The Militsioner was always somewhat concerned with what Pavel was doing at all times, but it was his job to concern himself with that kind of stuff. He was concerned with anything that happened within his range, and Pavel just so happened to be the only thing presently happening. But as long as Pavel wasn’t hopping a fence or causing trouble for anyone, the Giant seemed content to sit in silence.
He’d only been out a few minutes, though, when he saw the Militsioner leaning in his direction. A wave of irritation hit him. What the hell had he done now? And he said that with as much seriousness as he could muster, what could he have done? It was dawn, he hadn’t done anything except exist, much less anything that could be classified as ill-advised or illegal.
“Are you ill?” The voice booming from above him made him stop in his tracks, but it wasn’t the sound that stopped him. He was plenty used to that. It was the question. Was he ill? No; he didn’t think so anyway. But regardless, why would he care?
“No,” he answered curtly.
“Are you sure? You don’t look well.”
Jesus, did he look that bad already? That didn’t bode well. He grumbled something the Giant definitely couldn’t hear and continued on his way. He didn’t have the bandwidth to deal with this right now. He had a noise from behind him that, if he were crazy, he would have classified as concern.
“Ambulance, here.” Pavel’s gaze shot up and he saw a hand pointing down at him. He spun around.
“No no no! I’m fine, I’m just tired!” He was half irritated and half mortified at the direction this had suddenly taken. Even if he was sick, an ambulance? Really? It was excessive, but clearly the Giant didn't think so.
“There’s no harm in being certain.”
He was going to explode this man with his mind.
“I’m not going to die from a cold!”
The Giant’s eyebrows raised. “So you are sick?”
“No! That’s not-” Pavel rubbed his hands against his face. “I’m fine! You’re overreacting!”
The Militsioner was quiet for a few moments, his face unreadable. Pavel could just about see the gears turning in his head.
“I’m looking after you. That’s my job.”
Pavel strongly considered shouting back that the Giant’s job, as far as he was concerned, was being a living security camera and arresting people. The words were right on his tongue, but as he processed the Giant’s tone he chose to hold them.
As the ambulance rounded the corner, he wondered how much the Giant believed his own words.
The checkup was short, just like every other social interaction Pavel had had the past few days. It was concluded within a few minutes that no, Pavel was not sick, he was just tired and somewhat malnourished. They’d pushed a granola bar into his hands and hurried away.
Pavel had watched the Giant for the bulk of the time. He hoped dearly that his gaze was as scathing as he felt.
The Giant watched him right back. He looked unfazed. As always.
Bastard.
After the underwhelming and awkward checkup was over, he locked eyes with the man in the sky.
“Are you happy now?” he asked, fiddling with the cellophane wrapper around the granola bar. Pavel wasn’t very happy about the circumstances, but he was pretty hungry. Silver linings.
“Mmm.” That certainly didn’t sound like satisfaction. Pavel didn’t get why; why had he just gone through all that if not to prove something? Whatever the reason was, the Giant didn’t say anything more.