Logs:Close Off

Close Off
Dramatis Personae DJ, Matt
In Absentia Lucien, Hive	2024-10-06 "I got the impression Hive was quite upset." (some time after Lucien's assistance, followed by getting a ride.)
Location <NYC> The Refuge - Staten Island
The swath of destruction that the dimensional anomaly carved here in 2020 has been swept away and transformed into a large compound, practically a neighborhood in its own right. Much of the grounds are given over to meticulously landscaped parkland. Here are manicured gardens abutting half-wild groves, playgrounds and playing fields, a swimming pool as well as a fishing pond, and even a few acres of farmland. The residences, from the founder's house to the miniature arcologies and the slightly larger guesthouse, are styled like abstract beehives. So, for that matter, is the vertical hydroponic farm that produces far more food than the earthbound fields. In fact, there is a great deal of beehive imagery throughout, and even absent specific styling, hexagons are still more common than squares or rectangles in the construction of spaces and objects, all of which are thoughtfully designed with an eye toward community and comfort. At the heart of the Refuge is the meetinghouse that crowns the hill where the 121st Precinct once stood: architecturally distinct from most LDS houses of worship, this one looks from afar like an abstract sculpture of a conch shell in gleaming white quartzite. The floor plan is built on a Fibonacci spiral with a relatively gentle rise in elevation for the first four quarter-arcs before shooting up into a steep organic spire that can be seen for miles around. Dinner has been finished a while, but as many people as come and go around here it tends to be an event that lingers, on Sunday nights especially. There are still a good number of people in the dining room, boisterous and chatty even if the food is mostly down to crumbs of dinner. The kitchen is less bustling but no less warm, a considerably smaller cluster of people in here engaged in an earnest conversation over ongoing cleanup. DJ has his arms half submerged in dishwater, sleeves rolled up and tucked neatly above the elbow. The faucet is shut off for the moment as he scrubs the plates beneath the soaking water, though he's half turned aside to listen to one of the sisters in here with him. The young woman has semi-abandoned her post scraping food, her brows lifted as she gesticulates with the soiled bowl she's holding. "-- please, who has a relationship with their ministers now, it's just not the same at all." Down at the other end one of the other sisters has not stopped diligently drying dishes. "Well, no," she's venturing a little shyly, "but I don't think -- a mandatory relationship isn't exactly --" "-- still better than no relationship," cuts in the first woman, "sure, it had problems, but there's so many people falling through the cracks now!" DJ is still scrubbing, quiet. He glances back to the second woman, who's fallen silent again. "-- Lynlee, did you have more to say?" Dapper in his own clothes again, Matt is wending slow and weary through the house to find his host. He has smiles a-plenty for all the very nice brothers and sisters here, but he does not linger to chat. What can be glimpsed of his mind offhand through minimal psionic defenses -- just a thin shroud of mist that quiets his inner monologue to a soft murmur -- feels distant and mostly tranquil. Mostly. The sharp things that poke up here and there through the fog are difficult to identify other than as some species of pain, but he isn't really paying them much heed at the moment. They're distant, too. He drifts into the kitchen, curiosity sluggishly piqued more by the dynamics of the conversation DJ is facilitating than the actual content of the fragment he's caught. Piqued enough he does not immediately interrupt, at any rate. Not until he's fetched up against what he decided, after a quick and excessively complicated calculation, was the least obstructive counter to fetch up against. "Begging your pardon, I've come to borrow your --" << (brother/leader/prophet?) >> "-- DJ. Though I'm in no particular hurry and perfectly happy to help you finish up the dishes, first." Down at the dish-drying, Lynlee has been starting to pipe up again, brighter when DJ addresses her directly: "Oh! Yes, I -- there were good parts to home visiting, I just don't think it exactly lived up --" -- but when Matt comes in she falls back silent again. The other sisters (they are all sisters, in here with the dishes) seem vaguely amused at Matt's wording, though it's only one of them, carting in another load of dishes, who replies kind of laughingly: "Our DJ, now. Borrow away, he stole my station." DJ doesn't actually leave it until he's finished with the current stack of plates, at least, and then he's slipping away, drying his hands on a spare rag. "Did you get supper?" Matt's polite amusement matches the sisters', outwardly at any rate. "Thank you most kindly for your generosity." He inclines his head at the most recently arrived sister as she reclaims her post at the sink, then falls into step with DJ. "Yes, it was delicious." The reply is rote and technically correct, though he did not eat much and isn't yet confident he will keep down what he did eat. "It's well past time for me to get back to Greenwich, but I wanted to thank you for your hospitality these past few..." His temporal disorientation is intense but brief, and there's only the barest interrogative note to "...days. I hope I did not cause..." He lets that breath out slowly and draws another before continuing. "Too much additional consternation, while I was out." "It was -- kind of the least we could do, given we put you in that state to begin with." DJ is leading them towards a back door, holding it open for Matt and then slipping out to a quieter patio behind. He slips towards the edge of the lighted flagstones, leaning one shoulder up against a pillar. He turns his head, brows just a little pinched. "You were asleep. It wasn't much fuss." Matt does not comment aloud on the putting-him-in-that-state business, which in his mind is still a thorny tangle of << (it was necessary)(shouldn't have been necessary)(I deserved it) >> he hasn't had time or inclination to process. He follows DJ outside and tips his head back, eyes slightly glazed. << "Did I ever look up and see the moon, and the stars, and the sky?" >> Lucien's voice is asking with Pierre's words in his mind. << "Oh why have I been sleeping?" >> He looks back down at DJ and shakes his head. "Maybe I read too much into it -- I was a bit preoccupied at the time -- but I got the impression Hive was quite upset." This is very dry but not actually sarcastic. "He had every right to be. It would have upset anyone in their right mind and most who aren't. It should have upset me." His shoulders hitch minutely. "But it didn't. I doubt that helped matters." There's a small tightening in DJ's jaw, the beginnings of his teeth grinding, but he eases off. His eyes have fixed on Matt, though his steady expression is hard to read. After a few silent beats he looks back away, out in the distance where a cluster of tweens are toasting marshmallows for cocoa over a small fire pit in one of the gardens. "You're right," he says, at length. "It's well past time for you to get back to Greenwich." Matt inclines his head and says nothing more. He turns to get his bearings by the illuminated meetinghouse spire, whose clever exterior lighting makes it look like it glows from within. Whatever makes his breath tremble now, he's deliberately obscuring behind "Dust and Ashes". Then he walks out of the patio lights' reach, cutting toward the long driveway and humming tunelessly into the dark.