Logs:Matt vs. the Best Laid Plans

Matt vs. the Best Laid Plans
or, where the fuck was Ryan during The SHIELD Invasion?
Dramatis Personae Matt, The angry swarm of hornets constantly buzzing around Ryan's brain
In Absentia Jax, Joshua, Spencer, B, Spencer, Fury, Polaris, Steve, DJ, Hive, Tag	2022-12-21 "So when do we go?"
Location
July 10. Kitchen. Blackhaus. "...anyway, that's the rough idea. How it's actually going to look depends on how SHIELD reacts." Matt sets down his empty mug. "We can't push too far all at once, but a little at a time? If I play my cards right, they won't know they've been had until the situation is ridiculous that their best way out is just officially allowing visitors like it was what they meant to do anyway." He props his chin on the heel of his hand and lifts his eyebrows. "So. Sanity check?" Ryan is already refilling the steeper for a second round. He sits back down with a soft huff, mouth pulling further sideways with the slow drag of his hand against his scruffy cheek. "Shiiit, asking me for a sanity check might be even more've'a couillon notion than your whole cockamamie scheme. But fuck knows SHIELD isn't looking for a fight, and our folks can keep their heads on just fine, and --" He drops a sugar cube into each of their glasses, his shoulder hitching quick. "I know Jax is missing everybody." He looks up at Matt with a quick slant of smile. "So when do we go?" --- July 15. Signal. (Ryan --> Matt): Guess he kind of hared off without you but thumbs up from Joshua. (Ryan --> Matt): No shooting or depowering or other complications at least. (Ryan --> Matt): Which is good to know for Spence reasons. (Matt --> Ryan): Mm. It'd have been easier for him to handle just himself if things went gone sideways anyhow (Matt --> Ryan): I'd rather wait a while before sending Spence, but then HE might hare off. Be a dear and talk to him and the twins about this? (Ryan --> Matt): Sure. I can already feel the excited vibrating he's gonna do. (Ryan --> Matt): I will try to not lead with anything hare-raising, though. --- July 19. Times Square. Not far away there's people gathered, picket signs aplenty, the usual scattering of media; the young woman holding the microphone currently, with her halting anxiety-tripped stumble of words makes a sharp contrast to the ready fire that Ryan had been igniting the crowd with. Over here where he's parked himself now on a large concrete planter, it's only one person getting the full force of that fire -- mostly. None of their words carry beyond the small immediate bubble of space around them, but the anger sparking off Ryan in sharp-scattered flashes, that is carrying just a bit farther. "-- the rest of high school without his Pa? Just hour long visits every six months for this goddamned farce? I swear to fucking God next time we should visit the terrorist running the place and dangle him out the fucking window until he works this shit out, shady one-eyed bastard's got more pull with the feds than we ever will." Beside Ryan, Matt has borne this tirade largely in silence, though the cant of his head and the steady regard of his eyes suggest he is attending. When he does speak, the calm affection of his tone jars with the cold, empty rage behind it. "It is absurd, darling, and I'm angry, too. But we have to respect Jax's wishes. He doesn't want to hurt his case or get sent back to HAMMER, so that nixes outright attacking SHIELD. If he says fuck this and wants to get out of there, consequences be damned? We'll make it happen." He bumps his shoulder sidelong against Ryan's and offers him his half-drunk Arnold Palmer. "But he probably still won't want you to get yourself thrown in jail for semi-defenestrating Fury." --- July 26. Signal. (Ryan --> Matt): What the fuck (Matt --> Ryan): ? (Ryan --> Matt): POLARIS? Are you fucking serious? (Ryan --> Matt): I'm sure HER life has just been fucking upended by all this (Ryan --> Matt): Probably been losing HER entire goddamn mind with worry the past half a year (Ryan --> Matt): Obviously the very first person you'd think of here (Matt --> Ryan): No. If she had, I would have made a very different risk assessment calculation! (Matt --> Ryan): As it is I didn't let her out of my range (Matt --> Ryan): I'm sorry, dear, it's not a slight. This IS harder for you, for exactly the reasons you you gave (Ryan --> Matt): Not a fucking slight go fuck yourself (Ryan --> Matt): You have no fucking idea how hard this has been for me (Ryan --> Matt): You have no fucking idea how hard this has been for HIM (Ryan --> Matt): Fuck it (Ryan --> Matt): What the fuck am I even saying (Ryan --> Matt): Nobody ACTUALLY appointed you gatekeeper of visiting (Ryan --> Matt): I don't fucking need you (Ryan --> Matt): I could bring that whole goddamn place down without you (Matt --> Ryan): Of course you could, but please don't! (Matt --> Ryan): …Ryan? --- August 20. Kitchen. Tessier House. The kitchen fills with the rich fragrance of the very strong coffee Matt is decanting first into his guest's cup, then his own. "I just--on top of it all, I'm sure we could help that kid." His voice is agitated, whispering tight, flinty anger, detached curiosity, and a touch of incongruous anxiety to Ryan's senses. He sits down to doctor his coffee, the agitation in his tone vanishing, but not the emotional wavelengths beneath. "It's a pretty good bet he's a fan of yours, though. Both owing to your brilliance and--you know, statistics. If you come with me next run, you could put on a little concert." He quirks a fey smile that he shortly hides behind the rim of his cup. "At non-demolition volumes, preferably." Ryan is slumped up against the counter, one elbow propped on its surface and the press of his cheek into his palm stretching his face into an oddly distorted moosh. He drags the coffee closer with his spare hand, lifting it for a long swig. "Thanks," murmured as he lowers the cup, comes with a soft wash of calm to soften the edges of anxiety and anger. "Shit, I'll happily get all Jailhouse Rock up in there." Though even as he's saying this his brows are furrowing, his shoulders clenching in tighter. "... fuck." This is breathed out just a little softer than before. "You know I want to. You bring me in there I might just try to fus ro dah the whole damn place down. ...again." He swallows hard, eyes lowering to the coffee. "Think my SHIELD debut should wait this episode out." Matt sips slow, sets the cup back down slow, too. "Darling..." The aching affection in his voice belies the jarring simultaneous spill of relief and flare of rage it carries. "I know." --- September 7. Signal. (Matt --> Ryan): Sorry I got held up at school (Matt --> Ryan): New students, new explosions (Matt --> Ryan): Is it alright if Steve swings by to get Obie? (Ryan --> Matt): Still got all your limbs, I hope? (Ryan --> Matt): & the birdbrain is out with Horus but they should be back soon (Ryan --> Matt): I’ll make sure he’s all dressed up and ready to go. (Ryan --> Matt): How he’s gonna sneak ZENOBIA in there I am dying to know, though. (Ryan --> Matt): Just totally casually hauling the world’s biggest backpack. Of course you don’t need to know what’s inside I’m CAPTAIN AMERICA. Totally unpatriotic to question the snuffling noises. (Matt --> Ryan): Goodness, I haven't quite gotten around to inventorying limbs (Matt --> Ryan): Giant dog backpack is brilliant, and I wish I'd thought to suggest it (Matt --> Ryan): Mais non, he means to just walk them right in (Matt --> Ryan): It's probably also unpatriotic to enforce no pet policies on Captain America (Ryan --> Matt): Imagine being the agent trying to wrangle a puppy from Captain America when someone snaps a photo. (Ryan --> Matt): I guess I will have to shelve my imagining of a giant Cap sized PUPPYBJÖRN under a cape but sometimes life is disappointing. --- October 16. Blackhaus. The wreckage of a party (... maybe several parties all run together into one) is still strewn all across the house, but Ryan has taken a break from whatever desultory attempt he was making to straighten it in order to plunk a large bowl of hoppin' john down in front of his guest. He has no food -- just a whisky that is almost certainly not his first. "... is. He planning to make a habit of this?" He sounds equal parts curious and wary. "I mean, on the one hand there's a void that's been -- but -- uh." Matt looks about as much a mess as Ryan's house. He gamely starts in on the food when it materializes. "Thank you," is flat and muted, his habitual veneer of warmth--be it wry or flirty or just pleasant--abandoned tonight. He plucks the mug from Ryan's hand, rendering himself the Social Justice Bard for as long as it takes him to down a generous swallow. "Yep. Gods know I've wanted to revive game night, but it's just been..." Whatever it's been, his words fade into a half-hissed "ostie." Even his grief sounds detached and strange. Likewise, "I could nip this in the bud. It's going to be hell on Hive." --- October 27. Signal. (Ryan --> Matt): You up? (Matt --> Ryan): I could be if you're down (Ryan --> Matt): Hell yeah you know I got something smokin for you (Ryan --> Matt): Shit, technically it's for some fucking cop, I don't even want to joke about hitting that. (Matt --> Ryan): Oh gods it's not SO dire that we have to take one for the team with this guy (Matt --> Ryan): Let lung cancer do the hitting (Matt --> Ryan): Thank you my dear (Matt --> Ryan): Joshua doesn't complain, but I'M starting to feel self-conscious sending him to all corners of the earth fetching weird fruit (Ryan --> Matt): Pfft I was glad to have an excuse to duck away. (Ryan --> Matt): German motherfuckers did NOT know how to throw a party. --- November 5. Kitchen. Tessier House. Matt is sporting his "Jax was right" shirt and generally looking about as ready as he's going to be for the protest--while sober, anyway. "I think I managed to talk Tag down from bringing the whole Artfight to him." He's getting ahead of the sobriety situation now, adding a liberal pour of Jameson's to the steaming coffee in his thermos. "But the man is a bit capricious, so this run might turn into a logistical nightmare." Is Ryan sober? It is occasionally difficult to tell, as functional as he can be when high. His jittery-restless energy has been carrying him in paces around the kitchen, but he draws back to Matt now to hold his own thermos out for a splash. "If it's gonna be a tricky one, I could come with. This time. Not my usual style but I can keep a party pretty quiet." Matt's spikes Ryan's coffee with a flourish. His brows crinkle, his lips compress, but his wonted pensive hum is absent. "I'm not sure that's a great idea, darling." His tone is even, but run through with jagged conflicting flashes of fear and hope and frustration. "I'm going to ixnay any equipment he can't physically carry. That should keep things manageable." Ryan's eyes narrow sharply, and his mutation isn't necessary to feel the spike of hurt and fury that rolls off him -- but boy does it sure help. "Right. God fucking forbid shit gets unmanageable." --- December 21. Signal. (Matt --> Ryan): Ho ho ho, blessed Yule! (Matt --> Ryan): Keep this on the QT, but Fury is doing damage control in exactly the direction we'd hoped and making like one-eyed black Santa magnanimously dispensing permission for his prisoners to actually see their loved ones (Matt --> Ryan): And you, darling ho, are first in line to visit Jax this weekend! (Ryan --> Matt): Fuck him (Ryan --> Matt): he can rot in there (Ryan --> Matt): take Steve instead, that'd make the better photo op (Ryan --> Matt): As long as they keep their goddamned clothes on