Logs:A Light in Dark Places

A Light in Dark Places
Dramatis Personae Jax, Lucien, Matt, Ryan
In Absentia Erik, Fury, Shane, Tian-shin, Daiki	2023-05-13 "The gods themselves would fear to cross us." (set in the wake of a special delivery.)
Location <NYC> Detention Facility - Jax's Suite - SHIELD HQ - Times Square
A bit larger than the other detainee's rooms, this one has been converted from a small corner lounge for the guest rooms. Tall windows with a southern exposure let in copious sunlight if the unnecessarily high-tech curtains are drawn. The sitting area is small but comfortable and the sleeping area beyond it is screened off with interior partitions. There's a bulky desk in one corner with a computer rigged up nicely for video calls and a kitchenette tucked into another. A video comm panel by the front door allows for quick communication with both in-person visitors just outside the door or the security staff down the hall. The room decorations have been proliferating wildly -- the bed is now home to a menagerie of stuffed animals, mostly all Very New except for one old much-loved Cheer Bear perched atop the pillow. Greenery spills over from pots by the window ledge and hanging baskets. Art in many people's varied styles has been hung on the walls, with numerous of Jax's own sketches -- portraits of friends mingling with anthro characters and surreal cityscapes and nightmarish body horror, a large drawing of a stained glass window bearing an image of Apollo done in traditional church-window style -- tacked up on the desk. A number of stained-glass hangings refract colorful light in from the expensive windows. It was late, and it has gotten no earlier. Or it's gotten a lot earlier. Kinda a matter of perspective. It's definitely not a respectable time to be awake, though, and so it's a pretty safe bet that Fury's night is not going any better, because right about now there's a bigass dragonfly munching her way through a bigass tray of hamburger meat on SHIELD's rooftop, and not long before now, one of the most recognizable celebrities on the planet dismounted her and made his way into the detention wing at SHIELD. Let's hope that by this point Fury is too drunk to care. At this exact moment, Ryan Black is perched on Jax's desk, in well-tailored black jeans and dark purple tee (it reads 'Social Justice Bard' and, beneath, 'rallying the revolution'), sturdy purple Doc Martens. His languid posture -- boot propped on the desk chair, elbow propped back against the hutch -- is nothing noteworthy, but the gleaming longsword in one hand is. "Tea?" It's a very critical question. "How you gonna go just bring tea when we got a whole quest to do, tch!" He is pointing the sword, kind of lackadaisically in contrast to his critical tone, toward the door. "Jax just got plucked out of obscurity by the Hand of Destiny y'all not even half prepared. Next you gonna tell us you drove here, not even proper steeds at all. Jax," His head is rolling to the side, his tone very serious, "we might need a new party. Here I was, ready to turn my long held role over --" Despite professing his total lack of faith he is, in fact, now, stripping off his shirt, shifting the sword from one hand to the other so that he can remove it properly and toss -- shirt, thankfully, not sword -- towards their newest guests. "And all they bring for our journey is tea." The room overall has been wildly transformed, a dark and tangled forest overgrowing the furniture -- vines dropping low to snatch with gleaming-sharp thorns at clothes as they enter, strange dark-winged shapes fluttering through the trees, odd shadows scurrying beneath the bed, sharp-toothed creatures with malice in their eyes clawing and scrabbling at the windows, leaving bloodstains in their wake. Jax, in contrast, looks terribly prosaic in bright green tee -- its text matches Ryan's in style, 'SOCIAL JUSTICE PSION' in large capital letters, and under that in cursive, 'changing the way you think' -- and black kilt with rainbow paneling between the pleats. He has been flopped face-down at the edge of his bed, arms hooked over the edge of the mattress and chin resting on his hands. He clicks his teeth absently against a lip ring. Taps fingers lightly against the comforter. The sword in Ryan's hand scintillates, brighter than even the deadly-sharp steel should be glinting, rays of light coruscating from it to drive back some of the shadowy vines that are snaking hungrily out from the tangle of trees. Ryan sprouts, for a moment, a full set of exquisitely-wrought lightweight armor. Jax shrugs a shoulder. "Oh, I think we'll find what we need. Somewhere along the way. Kinda have to, what other choice we got?" Who knows what Very Urgent Text has summoned the Tessiers here at this ungodly hour. Lucien looks -- as put together as he generally does, actually, if casually so in soft blue short-sleeved henley and neatly tailored jeans. He does, as observed, have a thermos of tea in hand, but had not quite gotten around to sipping it when he entered. Instead he is looking -- not at the forest, not at the murderbeasts outside the window, that is par for the course. Not too much at Ryan stripping, that, also, more or less par for the course. His eyes drift to the sword. To Jackson. To the sword. To Ryan. To the sword. "We took a cab," is what he first says, one hand lifting to press forefinger and thumb to the hollows of his eyes. For a moment he rubs there, slowly, then passes the tea off to his brother. He is shedding his shoes even before he starts crossing the room, nudging Jackson aside as he drops himself heavily into the bed. "{You will have to keep minutes, tonight.} Our new bard can fill me in on what dragons we will be slaying. Once the sun is up." Matt, in an Elphaba-green tee with the classical silhouette of a broom-riding witch passing before a full moon, captioned with 'Yes, I can drive stick' and soft, threadbare jeans, looks more asleep than his brother when they enter, though seems to take the scene they find there in easier stride. "I know you didn't call us here to dis our Potion of Speed." He quaffs said potion deeply and hesitates an almost imperceptibly brief moment before stripping off his own shirt to don Ryan's, offering the one he's just shed back. "You can be the witch, then, unless you are invoking the Law of Inverse Armor to distract our foes. What," he's finally getting around to asking, curious and rapidly shedding his somnolence, "are we questing for?" He sinks into the chair at the desk, not dislodging Ryan from his footrest but draping himself against his leg instead. He studies the sword, brows furrowing, though his curiosity is entirely untroubled when he says, "That's...a real sword. Did you get a visit from the Lady of the Lake?" "Called you here for a quest. I thought we made that pretty clear." Unfortunately for Matt's shirt, Ryan props himself up just enough to catch it on the point of the -- very! pointy! very! real! -- sword. Fortunately for Matt, Ryan has actually been sober since Spence vanished, and there will probably be a new shirt on his doorstep as soon as one can reasonably be delivered. "Sword's Jax's. Magneto smithed it for him. Pretty sure we're questing for vengeance." Ryan tips the recently-skewered shirt delicately onto the ground and, at least, slides the sword carefully back into its simple wooden sheath before handing the scabbard down to Matt. "I look like a fucking witch to you, man? It is role swap AU tonight." He is beckoning, lazily, with one finger to Jax, his other hand dropping to curl fingers idly through Matt's hair. Jax moves himself willingly when Lucien arrives, shifting himself up enough to allow some manner of comfortable sleeping spot. "Fury weren't none too pleased 'bout bringing a sword in here but it seems a bit silly to fuss, well -- considering." His eyepatch shifts, a smiling-sun emoji beaming cheerfully from it, then blinking -- so quick it's easy to miss, into 💥 -- then back to the bright happy 🌞 once more. "Magneto did forge it and far as I can tell that's 'bout as close as I'm ever gonna get to an actual Wizard handing me a magical weapon." Obliging Ryan's beckoning, he's peeling off his Psion tee, tossing it to the audiokinetic before draping himself back down beside Lucien where he sleeps. "Missing children, magical weapon, wizard, I'd say we done got ourselves a quest." "Lucky for our quest, I have venge enough to spare, in the unlikely event anyone should run low." Matt accepts the scabbard gingerly and turns it over in his hands. "Magneto. Goodness, but that certainly is a statement! This is for disposing of whoever took the children, then?" His terror and his rage alike are strangely--though not so very strangely for him, really--muted and hollow. "Does Fury know who made this? If so I'd wager he's desperately trying to trace it back to its maker as we speak, little help though your phone is like to be." There's smugness here, and fondness, too. "I'm assuming he didn't soar up to your window to bestow this." He leans into Ryan's hand, catlike, and there's a trace of solace threaded into his words when he adds, "'May it be a light to you in dark places', as it were." Ryan reaches up and snags the shirt out of the air but doesn't bother to put it on, pfft. Just lies back again, kind of drapes an arm over Matt's shoulder. Kind of drapes Shirt aesthetically over his own shoulder. Just enough shirt to highlight exactly how little shirt he has, though admittedly the twisted network of knotted-thick scars gracing his torso are less beguiling than Jax's vivid panoply of art. "Jax doesn't know the first fucking thing about using a sword, do we think that's -- gonna be a problem? You all have more genre savvy here than I got, I was pretty much only allowed to read the Bible until I graduated high school." "You didn't never graduate high school." Jax eyes the sword in its sheath pensively. "I'm pretty sure part of the quest is the learning. Besides, I know where the pointy bit goes, that's the real thing. And if someone's done took the children --" He doesn't finish this thought, but the cold fury beneath his voice is palpable, and not just to Ryan. "--Shane brung it in, anyhow, not that his phone'll help much neither. Fury was not real pleased about midnight sword delivery and not real pleased about midnight Magneto sword delivery but --" His shoulders tense, the strange forest-scape around the room melting into just shadows. He curls back, slightly, against where Lucien lies. "Been a real weird time. Someone out there wants to show me they got our back through this nightmare I'm gonna take up that arms an' keep moving." His eye darts to Matt, and his smile returns, somewhat fiercer than before. "I'm calling it Sunbeam." "Oh, not knowing how to use the sword when you receive it is absolutely essential for a Chosen Hero." Matt sounds incredibly serious on this point, balancing the sword across his lap now as if his arms are too tired to hold it up, though maybe it was just to one hand to take his tea back up and the other to indicate his sleeping brother with a flourish. "Your fellow adventurers will help you learn as you go, though this isn't quite Luci's style of swording. Dai's either, really. Tian-shin, maybe?" His head tilts and looks up at Ryan critically, then adjusts Shirt to drape just so. "You also can just shoot lasers from it, Link-style." He lifts up the sword--scabbard and all--and levels it at one of the monsters at the window. Jax can feel the deft touch of Matt's power twining through his to illuse a dazzling pulse of light rippling along Sunbeam and then speeding out to strike the also illusory monster. "Someone out there having your back is excellent, also, but the kinds of mortals who would rally to Sunbeam if you but gave the word? The gods themselves would fear to cross us."