ArchivedLogs:Supply and Demand

Supply and Demand
Dramatis Personae Nox, Jackson, Micah
In Absentia	25 June 2013 Dropping off supplies for the Morlocks!
Location <MOR> - Beneath New York
Buried beneath the bustle and noise of New York's busy streets, the world underneath the city is a quieter place. Quieter, but far from deserted. Occasional ladders, often rusting, ascend to the city above and are evidence that at /one/ point these tunnels had been in use, or had been planned for it; perhaps by way of maintenance, or access to subways or sewers. These stretches have been abandoned by civic infrastructure for some time now, though, but occasional scraps of evidence -- discarded food wrappers, piles of tatty blankets or moldering old mattresses, sometimes voices carrying echoes through the dank concrete -- give evidence that /someone/ still uses these tunnels. The rumbling of subway trains sounds frequently through the walls, many of the train routes accessible through various doors and openings. When the Morlocks began to discover care packages close to previously frequently used tunnels, they began to take rather more interest in the surface world. Surely they’d maintained /some/ links during the lockdown but it was of the furtive sort, never the same entrance twice, lone scavengers sort of interest. But with food coming to /them/, well... Someone’s put together a regular schedule, with sentries assigned to make checking the drop spots prior to taking up whatever their position for the day might be. Whenever Nox is on duty, she checks all of the spots--the advantages of traveling so quickly, down here in the dark. She’s also taken it upon herself, in those places where packages have appeared most regularly, to make the going less arduous. Fewer briars, fewer blind drops, lightbulbs returned here and there to their rusting cages so it isn’t /entirely/ dark...just a few small touches, beyond the disappearance of the goods, to let their benefactors know that the items have been received and are appreciated. The heat above has turned the tunnels below into a swampy realm. The humidity edges towards the chillier but still the air is thick, and not entirely pleasant. This particular chamber is below one of the parks, and there’s a grating high above that throws lances of dying sunlight against a moist, mossy wall. Garbage litters the floor but most of it has been pushed to the edges of the room--a needful precaution, given how much of that wreckage consists of old needles and fresh condoms. And then there is Nox herself, loitering. She sticks close to the tunnel she’d emerged from, sticks close to the ground--a posture made easier by taking on a much-loved cat form--but her head is craned back, black eyes fixed on that distant slice of sunset color above. Getting entire carts full of supplies -- groceries, toiletries, first aid supplies, fresh-picked veggies from the still-carefully-tended guerrilla garden plots, even some more frivolous (if you don't place great value on sanity, anyway) sundries like books and games -- down into the sewers unnoticed by the world above is not admittedly the /easiest/ of tasks. It goes a little more smoothly with an illusionist in tow but even then it takes some careful tricks of timing; a little waiting, a little loitering. Invisibility does not come easily, and trying to hide this entrance from the outside world means Jax is paying little attention to who is watching from the /other/ side. It is, then, from Nox's vantage point not invisibility but instead a rather surreal distortion of shape and colour that blots out the sunlight slanting through the grate. No amount of light bending can hide the rusty scrape of metal, the scrabble of sneakers for purchase against slimy-mossy wall. Odd blur resolves into actual person-form as Jax half-climbs, half-slides, half-just falls down to the floor below. He isn't very colourful today, save the everpresent bright tattoos and sparkle of metal all through his face; black cargo pants, grey t-shirt. He does not land very /gracefully/, thunk! And wipes grime off his knees as he stands, glancing back upwards. Something shimmers, very faint in the dim light, in a slanting ramp of a wall that stretches down from grate to floor before, "-- mmkay. S'do this quick," travels back upwards, slightly strained in tone. Micah is, likewise, not very colourful presently. He has opted for a pair of jeans that is not heavily patched in /brightness/ and his dark-brown T-shirt with a stegosaurus cursing a T-rex’s ‘sudden but inevitable betrayal’ on it. This nondescript dullness is not helped along by the splash of red (and only /redder/ by summer sun!) that is his hair. Not that much of the outside world could see him through Jax’s invisibility bubble, but… “Not /too/ quick,” Micah jokes in what amounts to a stage-whisper, trying not to be overheard by passersby, yet /be/ heard by Jax down below. “Or you’ll get squished by incoming /groceries/. Speakin’ of which, heads up!” He flashes a grin in Jax’s direction before working the first cart down the /nearly invisible/ ramp for the other man to receive at the bottom. “Wish we had a better way t’make sure folks was gettin’ this stuff /timely/. Would be able t’guarantee less spoilin’ that way, at least.” Nox really, really needs to develop a system that will prevent people from suffering heart attacks when she makes her presence known. She might have withdrawn when the tunnel is first breached, ever watchful, but as soon as the pair are recognized she slides from the opposite tunnel, along the wall and towards theirs. Her purpose, to catch and lift the cart down carefully, before Jax gets hit. Hello, shadows! Or, really, one small shadow and /many/ tentacles, curling around the cart and rolling it to the side. “Are you all right?” This whisper bounces around them--above, behind, to the side--as she builds herself up from small shadow to larger one, generically person shaped. Only her eyes are the same, blinking solemnly at each of them in turn. “Mister Holland. Micah. I thought...it might be you.” "Hive might still got a link in to Jim, think he's been gettin' sort of. Poked at now and then 'round deliverytime maybe? I ain't checked in with him, maybe everything's just rotting." Jackson is standing, not at the base of the ramp but beside it when that cart is worked through. He doesn't reach for it when it starts to slide, though there is a faint shift of light that suggests just /how/ he means to slow and then break its fall. But instead, suddenly shadows! His eye widens and he takes a quick step back, abruptly more tense than he was before. The ramp vanishes immediately with his startlement. "-- Nox." It's not exactly /comfortable/, his greeting, but it's certainly not hostile either. Just the same wary-tense as his posture. "It's just Jax." It takes a moment and a few deep breaths before the ramp reappears, even if it's unnecessary with Nox there now. "-- We're good for the other one," he tells Micah, pulling his gaze back up to the opening. “Hopefully that’s workin’. It’s still kinda hard to believe Jim wandered down into the underground. Don’t he need sunlight a fair bit, too?” From Micah’s vantage point up in said bright sunlight, the cart seems to just /disappear into darkness/ part way down Jax’s ramp! “Jax!” comes out as a squeak, as Micah remembers he should /not/ be shouting about halfway through the sound exiting his mouth. “Nox?” is back to the stage whisper as the two down below make their greetings. “Nox!” Micah fumbles for a moment with what to /do/ with himself. Clearly…there need to be hugs for Nox /now/, but she is down there and he is up here and… Jax’s request for the second cart snaps him back to the task at hand. “Oh…right, I should…get that.” The second cart starts its roll down the shimmer-ramp. Oh no, there’s two carts? Nox hadn’t anticipated a second; she’s already eased back towards the other tunnel entrance, closer to darkness, away from the /shimmer/. It seems Jax will be able to use his methods after all! And while he does, she’ll study him. From that...safe distance. Over there. Were she less artificial in appearance, she might well be chewing on her lip. But...she isn’t. “Jax,” she says to acknowledge the correction. For now. Then her eyes flick rampwards again. “Micah...he should...Jim. Is. Usually the one. To be here. To move things.” She stops, then adds (needlessly), “Those are his briars. In the tunnels now. It is very, very useful, in keeping people away.” Cue a head duck, as she realizes the implications. “Not...you, though. Thank you, Jax.” The second cart is slowed on its descent by a small ridge in the ramp, then a second further down once the first disappears. /Then/ Jax, reaching to steady it, right it, set it solidly down on the floor and wheel it aside. He draws in a slow breath, leaning heavily against the laden cart. For a moment he is silent, and judging by his lean this might just be exhaustion but judging by the very long hard look he gives Nox it might not just be. "-- You next?" he finally manages, up to Micah. He pulls himself away from the cart to stand next to the slide. For Micah, no /speed bumps/, just a steadying hand to catch his when he nears. "S'a lot of people down here," he says, when he's turned away from Nox towards the ramp. "/They/ don't deserve to starve and die for you." “We got it, hon,” Micah calls down, still in…somewhat muted tones. “Done this a few times. No need to bother Treebeard with it none ‘less he just wants to come say ‘hoom’. I mean ‘hi’.” He /might/ be a little excited to see Nox. Which /might/ be making him act a little sillier than usual. “Yes, me next!” Jax’s hand is definitely needed to stop him from /rushing headlong into a wall/ with momentum. That was…decidedly going too fast. Jax ends up getting hugs /first/ between /excite/ and sneaky-self-steadying. Then, if Nox looks solid enough for it…Micah-hugs are /incoming/. It’s a close thing, Nox’s solidity. Already wisp at the edges, still grey-striped in places where the burns went deepest, and perhaps hesitant to fully manifest, there’s a moment following Jax’s response in which she seems on the verge of disappearing entirely. Or at least melting into shadow, head down, uncertain. But then there is a Micah launched in her direction and manners dictate she prevent his tumbling into muck and garbage! Wisps come together at the last minute, so dark arms can curl around the young man in a return of the hug--or steadying of him. They look to be one and the same. “Hello and thank you,” she whispers into his ear, before letting go with a quick glance Jaxwards. “He is...Jim is well. He’s been a boon but I have yet to hear him say ‘hoom’. Perhaps if you ask nicely. When...the next time. When you come.” She pauses...then adds, “I am sorry. For all of this. For you needing to do this.” Jax's return Micah-hug is tighter than necessary, if brief. There is a moment longer where he doesn't look at Nox, still, tipping his gaze back to focus steadily on the shafts of sunlight streaking in from above. Some of that light shifts, gathers in a brighter curl around his arm before vanishing. "Sorry," he finally repeats, heavy rather than accusing as he turns around. "Nox, do you got any /idea/ what you've --" His hands are fisting up at his sides, and he moves them, too, joining tightly together behind his back. "Sorry's a word that don't really mean a whole lot, times like now." Micah is nervous energy /vibrating/ through the hug. “Oh! Nox-honey. Hi an’ you’re more than welcome. You an’ everybody. It’s a shame y’all can’t come to the gardens on your own an’ the world’s gone madder’n usual…an’ not in the /fun/ way. I missed you an’ I been so /worried/ an’…” Micah /gnaws/ at his lower lip when Nox releases the embrace. When he speaks again, it is haltingly. “I can’t imagine. I can’t imagine the state you must’ve been in…for…that to happen. What happened.” Jax’s comments have him chewing on his lip again like maybe he missed a few meals. “She didn’t mean…you know she didn’t mean for it. People just lose their /minds/ sometimes when. When there’s too much horrible.” The intrusion of light causes another retreat. Shimmers are one thing, the gathering of those distant shafts another. The darkness clusters heavily around the secondary route, the place she’d come through. Stepping back into that gloom, Nox loses some of her distinction. “There is no excuse.” An oft-repeated line but one that sounds as genuine now as it did when she first said it. “I have heard...some things. Ms. Basil and Mr. Law came into the tunnels. They...they told me that the police have been...that they killed a man, and have been...has it...” If she had lungs, she’d take a moment to take a breath. Instead there’s just another lengthy pause. “I should have had more control. But I will be turning myself in. Soon. Ms. Basil is advising me. Has it continued?” “Didn’t /mean it/?” For Micah, Jackson’s tone is sharper than it was with Nox, a sudden furious snap that comes with another quick flare of light before he manages to rein it in. “Didn’t fucking mean it, great, I guess it’s all /okay/ then. No, Micah, I wouldn’t have the first /idea/ how people react when they been through too much horrible.” He takes a step back away from both of them, unclenching his hands to grind the heel of one hard against his eye. “No,” manages to be more level, but it’s the /aggressively/ patient level of someone dealing with the very young or very mentally unsound, “there ain’t no --” His teeth click together with the abruptness of their sudden clench. He draws a slow breath, then another. “There’s been more’n /one/ death for this, Nox. They bombed Evolve. My son got shot. -- Didn’t die. S’fine. But the man who did? /You/,” and this time it /does/ sound like an accusation, “wouldn’t be alive if t’weren’t for him. He was one of ours. One of /mine/. /My/ team and -- great. You’re sorry. Maybe you should think hard about how soon, cuz every day /you/ sit down here being sorry there’s more blood spilled up there.” “His name was Ian,” Micah says quietly, but evenly, when Nox refers to him as ‘a man’. As if that were the most important detail. “He was a friend.” He shrinks at the combination of sudden flashing and snapping, without the excuse of needing to retreat into shadow. When he does speak again, it is still in that quiet, even tone. “I didn’t say that made it okay. /Nothing/ has been okay. You think I don’t know…?” He doesn’t specify. How not okay it is? How much horrible Jax had been through? His eyes travel back and forth between Jax and Nox. “You just think for a second her headin’ right up to turn herself in wouldn’t /somehow/ make everythin’ worse? Or wouldn’t have done?” That flare succeeds in driving Nox /into/ the tunnel. Shrinking literally? She can do that, like a crab retreating into a hole. She might even have remained there, fled deeper and sent someone else back for the food, but something keeps her in place. When enough time has passed to be certain that the light has well and truly faded, eyes appear again. Just that. Eyes in the darkness, staring unblinking at Jax. “There is no excuse,” she whispers again. “I did not know they had...I did not know but there is no excuse. I would have gone. Should have gone. Will go. Please. Not the light.” The light has faded, though intermittently it glimmers, a very faint misty glow that shivers around Jax’s clenched fists, but no farther. He takes another step back, jaw still clenched as well. The quiver of light makes it a very /visible/ dialing-back, fingers slowly uncurling, muscles slowly relaxing, and only last the glow snuffed out into darkness. “No,” he agrees, slowly, “-- It’ll probably just mean more blood again.” The heel of his palm grinds against his eye. “Do Claire think you should -- go up? I don’t rightly know what -- Micah’s right,” comes reluctantly through teeth that are starting to clench again. “It won’t help. It won’t help nobody up there and it sure won’t help /you/.” “Don’t,” Micah admonishes simply, when Nox says she will go. “Don’t do anythin’ /else/ rash. That…” he cuts himself off with a jerky shake of his head. “Listen to Claire. She’ll know how to minimize the damage, if anyone does. For everyone’s sake.” He just stands equidistant between the two others. Different reasons for wanting to offer comfort to each. Different reasons for /not/ doing so at the moment. “Damage.” Two whispered syllables, heavy enough that they seem to come from the shadows wreathing the floor--except for the floor immediately around Jax’s feet. She’s drawn /those/ back, to be sure. “Ms. Basil said no. I said yes. She is finding a way. I would...prefer sooner. If I could...if it could have been me. If I could take it back.” The darkness shifts in that low tunnel, or makes a sound very much like shifting--belly scales against concrete, or chitin against stone. Something is in there. Hopefully it’s her. “I think. Perhaps. I should go. And you...it is not safe. Here. Below.” “It ain’t safe anywhere just right now.” Jackson’s hand drags upwards, from eye across to press hard against his temple. Then up higher, scuffing across his bare skull. He takes another half-step backwards at those slithering-shifting sounds. “I think right now just about everyone up top is just /looking/ for --” He hesitates, scrunching his eye up tight with a duck of his head, a small since. “-- things t’be mad at,” he finishes, a little more subdued, a little more self-conscious. “Jus’ be more riots, they throw the book at you. ‘sides which --” He hesitates again, his hand dropping to his side with a heavy smack against his thigh. His words come heavy, too, dragged up from somewhere reluctant to work their way out, “Y’don’t. Need another cell. More lights. Y’need /help/, Nox. Like the serious kind of help. Y’sure ain’t gonna find it in no courtroom.” “’If’ games ain’t gonna do nothin’ but drive people mad…madder. Wherever we are,” Micah says to try to stop the potential /snowball/ that such statements tend to have. “An’ everyone /is/ lookin’ for the least excuse. That means we--you all…” he bites down on his lip again, having trouble choosing pronouns. His hands fidget at the material of his jeans like denim is novel and interesting. “We. Can’t afford t’fight each other. Can’t even afford /not/ t’help each other.” He nods toward Jax to acknowledge and affirm his statements. “’Cause there’s a lotta help that’s needed an’ not near enough supply of it.” “Sometimes it is needful. To be mad. To...do.” What? Nox might have lost her train of thought; she doesn’t clarify. The scuttling sounds die away. A moment later, the darkness grows deeper, at least around that tunnel. Deep enough that hints of shape can be seen inside of it--a shoulder there, a turned head here. The hostess, lured from her hole. “Is there anything? That you need. We...I...can provide? It was...you are both. Very kind. We owe you a great deal.” “Yeah. It’s needful, for sure. But you can’t just /be mad/, you gotta have /some/ kinda --” Jackson’s eye scrunches up again. He tips his head back, opening it to just look upwards at the fading sunlight coming through the open hole. “-- sanity to it. Rage unfocused don’t do nothin’ but destroy everything it touches. What’s it you want to -- to /do/, Nox?” His head tips back down, this time studying Micah more than her. “S’a lot we can’t afford just now,” is a quieter mutter. His head shakes quickly to Nox’s last question, but it gets no words from him in answer, just a thin press of lips, and a look downward. Micah watches the appearance of shadow-forms in the tunnel. “I’m sorry, hon, but I think workin’ with Claire an’ watchin’ out for your people down here’s the best help I can think of for you. Unless you can find real help…for yourself. An’ not goin’ topside. At all.” He offers her a sad expression that could be called a smile for all that one corner of his mouth tilts upward with it. Even that fades again quickly. He glances back to Jax, uncertain. “Do? No. Not me. The people upstairs. If I...” But Micah interjects his opinion, and between the pair of them, they reduce Nox to silence again. She considers and then gives a vague, wispy nod. “I will wait for Ms. Basil. To say. I am...not to go above, no. They said it is better that way.” Barely visible hands are wrung together. “I should go and you should go,” she repeats. “It is dangerous here. The Hounds are awake. When you come back. I will have someone else come. For the food.” Jackson stays frowning down at the floor for a moment. Eventually he looks back up at Micah, expression twisting into something decidedly discomfited as his digs knuckles against his eye again. “No, you -- I think Micah’d be sad if you didn’t -- I’ll. Be. Better. With the light. Not-light.” His shoulders tighten up, and he lapses back into silence. Hounds? Micah doesn’t even ask. There is no room for even knowing what that means right now. He looks for a moment as if he might protest Nox stating that she will send someone else, then nods resignedly instead. Then he nearly protests again at Jax pushing past it. His expression is clearly conflicted. “I…just want…” He shakes his head again, seeming to decide that it isn’t even worth saying. “We’ll go. I hope…this helps. Let us know if there is anythin’ else we can bring, something we might have forgotten.” “This is a great help. You are a great help. They will be glad for it. And grateful. And you...” Nox hesitates. A tendril creeps forward to brush Micah’s shoulder, hardly solid enough to feel before it fades. Jax is offered a more formal nod. And the supplies? She leaves them for now, creeping backwards into her shell-tunnel--no doubt to observe their going, having forgotten parting words to offer on her own behalf. “I’m --” That’s as far as Jax gets, really, before just trailing off and swallowing. “We’ll bring more in a couple days. Tell Jim t’let us know if -- he knows how to send word. For more stuff. If we forgot --” He watches as Nox creeps off, but then turns his attention upwards. He’s grateful, really, for the supplies left there, because he moves back closer to brace himself against the second cart as the air starts to shimmer once more. This time in a small series of platforms -- kind of /precarious/ in that they have no handholds or guard rails and float at irregular uneven intervals in the air. But. Steps, of a sort. For the careful. Micah’s hand skims over that tendril, trying to let that touch convey all of his meaning as he departs…whether it is a touch to a solid thing or more a gesture of intent by the time he reaches it. As Nox retreats, he turns to follow Jax. He moves to place a hand on the other man’s shoulder when he sees him bracing against the cart…fully expecting it to be /uncomfortably/ hot at best, but not caring. The steps don’t look like they’re going to be easy. But what is? It is definitely not a comfortable touch, heat radiating through Jax’s thin t-shirt. “M’sorry,” he says, very quiet. “I --” And then silence. He lifts a hand, fingers trailing lightly against Micah’s back, but then resting a little firmer in something more support than affection. “I’ll be right behind you,” he says, quiet and a little tense. “C’mon.” Micah just shakes his head at the apology, plucking up Jax’s other hand and brushing a (needfully, for the heat) quick kiss against the inside of his wrist. At the other man’s direction, he leads the way back up, and out, toward the dying light.