ArchivedLogs:A Hot in the Dark

A Hot in the Dark
Dramatis Personae Nox, Tatters
In Absentia	4 February, 2013 Tatters stops to catch up with Nox re: Xavier's School.
Location <MOR> Welcome to the Freakshow
Wider and more spacious than many of the surrounding nooks and niches, this chill cavern is the central hub of the Morlock's underground network. With tunnels branching off in many directions, it takes a while to learn to /navigate/ from here to where you want to go, but there's generally plenty of more experienced people around to teach newcomers the ins and outs of the pathways. Here, though, is a safe place to come and relax, for what value of relaxation can be found among moss-covered walls and the occasional stagnant puddles on the floor. There's been furniture brought in, a mismatched assortment of crates, mattresses with busted springs, a few broken and subsequently repaired chairs, a folding table in a corner. Shelves along a wall hold entertainment; books, a smattering of board and card games, sometimes snacks. There's even electricity, wiring none too safe and visible in places where the wall has been broken open; the naked light bulbs flicker often and the lone outlet has had so many power strips attached it is undoubtedly a fire hazard. Tatters sits crosslegged on a blanket next to an old space heater that looks more like a fire hazard than anything else, its cord snaking out to plug into the erratic mess of wiring. It would be more atmospheric, perhaps, for her to sit around a fire -- but she's in a /cavern,/ they're short enough on atmosphere as it is. She looks almost as though she's meditating, sitting crosslegged with her hands at her sides, eyes closed and head bowed; beside her, a damp backpack and a smattering of clothes are layed out to dry, though her sweatshirt seems as undamp as anything gets around her. Her skin is noticeably darker and paler than it usually is, but as she sits, eyes closed, color is slowly and methodically creeping back into her flesh in a slowly expanding network of strips and patches. It's slow going, however, and she presently looks more...mottled, than anything else. Sometimes it seems that Nox has a sixth sense. Annalee is brooding? Nox appears with several of the children and a request for arts and crafts assistance. Sunder getting restless? Nox pops up with reports of a tunnel needing clearing or shoring up. And Tatters? Well, sometimes Nox just doesn't know -what- she's going to do about Tatters but in this instance, the young woman's meditation is interrupted with a green Army blanket. It drifts up to where Tatterhood is sitting and gives a wooly rustle at her, ghost-style, draped roughly at Nox-height. "Ooo, I sense someone in need of warming, oooooo..." The "ghost" hunkers down, shadow bleeding from beneath its hem. "Too much?" Tatters cracks an eye open, the eye in question swiveling towards the side of her face as she regards the spectre for a second, impassively. Then she breaks out in a grin and opens her other eyes, chuckling and shaking her head as she glances up. "Um. Something 'bout the chill of the grave? Sorry, my head's not set right for witticisms. I won a fierce battle against the cold and the wet, but now must replenish my army." A little exhalation of breath, and she holds up a dry, dark-mottled hand. "Manually reopening capillaries is boring, but oddly soothing." "I have taken up knitting, I find it to be just the same. Knit, purl, knit, purl...it could put an insomniac to sleep." As she speaks, Nox lifts the blanket and swirls it like a practiced matador so that the drag wool settles over Tatters' back. The woman herself is slightly more tangible than is typical down here in the caverns--she's solid enough to wear a garish gypsy skirt of crumpled linen with a heather grey Harvard sweatshirt, both much mended and thin from the years. The skirt puddles around her as she settles in a lotus before Tatters. "In any battle, every little bit helps, yes? Or perhaps, to the victor goes the spoils. What took you into the fray?" "I've had the Cold's match these past weeks, but last night I underestimated the strength of it's ally: the Wet. Um." Tatters straightens and adopts a formal tone, then drops it and flicks her eyes innocently up and to the right, towards the cavern ceiling. "I found a run of /suspiciously/ clean water and followed it back towards the surface. It came out under the reservoir in Central Park. So I ended up, uh, swimming the rest of the way. It was very silly." She pauses and looks down at her hands, then glances back up to the other woman, pulling the blanket about her shoulders with a grateful smile. "Knitted anything interesting yet?" Nox touches her thumbs to her middle fingers and adopts the most zen of poses. Formality doesn't seem out of place, though there is a suspicious twinkling in her oh so dark eyes, like distant stars laughing. "Of course. Who doesn't enjoy a pleasant swim deep in the bowels of winter? One might suspect, dearest girl, that you are perhaps taking your jests of Gollum too seriously." She pauses for effect. "Of course, there but for the grace of God...thus far I've yet to knit anything beyond a ribbon. Perhaps a snake. It was very snake-like before I had to pull it apart. Positively reptilian. Is clean water so suspicious? Was it a pleasant swim?" "It was /unusual./ I wanted to check it out. If it was, like, a water main leak they'd be sending people down to fix it, and that's good to know in advance." Tatters sits back and crosses her arms, pulling the blanket tight with the same gesture as she stares pensively at the...okay, a space heater is way less interesting to stare pensively at than a fire. But beggars can't be choosers. "Swim was short, but okay. And it wasn't /that/ dangerous. But, um. I might have to do something way more dangerous soon. I was going to look for you once I finished all the fixing." "This is why you are a Knight and me but a humble chatelaine," Nox says solemnly. What passes for eyebrows with the woman are lifted. She relaxes her fingers, letting them open. "Oh?" The prompt is softer than even her usual tone of voice. After it's given, she waits silently and in apparent contentment to be silent--pensive is a cue she knows all too well. Tatters is quiet for a long moment, then shrugs and looks back up, sighing and nodding in a north-upwardsly direction. "Uh, I met a couple of kids at the lake. Like, fishmorphs. Brothers. When I mentioned that I have trouble morphing, they said there's folks who could help -- a private school a bit from the city, that's like...us, I guess. Mutant haven, only a school, and more secret. They invited Lily and I to visit." Tatters rolls her eyes and sits back, uncrossing her arms and resting her weight on her palms. "It's prob'ly either a trap or a front or something else sketch, but if they're real I think they're people we should know. And if they /aren't,/ we need to find out and warn people that their fake Narnia High isn't what it sounds like." Nox is quiet for an equally long time. Her finger slowly curl back into her palms and her eyes close, causing that glint of light to disappear. This is thinking Nox, a cut out of a woman, repose in silhouette. Barely visible, her lips purse. "Tell me about the brothers," she says finally. "About the fishmorphs. I can't and won't say that I enjoy the thought of you walking into a place away from the city. Away from the tunnels. Trap or real, away is -away-." And she doesn't like away, as might be seen in the way the darkness begins to press in around the space they occupy, obscuring them from the rest of the cavern. "They were teenagers. Seemed alright. Helped me get the, uh, drain hatch open when it got stuck in the ice, were concerned if I was okay. They were friendly, bickered a little, seemed pretty close." Tatters shrugs once more and adjusts the blanket, closing her eyes and absently reconstruction a patch of skin along her forearm as she thinks. "And away is...necessary. It's strategy: we aren't self-sufficient here. We have to scrounge. I dun want to make us beholden to outsiders -- especially if they're sketchy -- but we could use things. Clean water. Wiring that's not threatening to catch fire. A hydroponics garden. And Nox, we have kids." Tatters looks up, sighing and glossing over the fact that /she's/ pretty much one of them. It doesn't matter, she's being Mature now. "They could use an education, so they don't just waste away down here. We could give them a future. And," she smiles hopefully, with a breath, "If we make this place as livable as we can, then they'll come /back/ and help make it better. Or go their own way: either is better than being trapped." A tremor goes through the gathering darkness, an inhalation that leaves it pressing closer and closer until Nox thinks to relax. It still looms but at least the shadows aren't trying to steal everything--sight, breath, sound. She makes a sound meant to approximate the clearing of a throat she doesn't have. "One supposes that good could come of it. One supposes there are things we need here that scrounging or Rite Aid won't provide. One also supposes that any prospective student visiting a campus should not be without their guardian." Her eyes open but the stars there are wearing a veil. "Tell them yes and tell them that we will be three." Orange eyes regard her levelly, tiredly glancing towards the wings of darkness enclosing them and then back up towards the woman herself -- or her core, at least -- an obvious thread of concern in her expression. "Are you sure? This trip could be far more dangerous for you than for us. And you...um. You don't sound convinced." Tatters looks worried, but calm. She's usually calm; her heart rate doesn't increase unless she tells it to, and adrenaline is something she's yet to remaster. "I don't like away." There, she's said it. It's out, in the open--and hazy--air. Nox lifts and spreads her hands. She isn't denying the need for concern, it's meant to be a gesture of acceptance. "But who else would go? Who else /should/ go? Callisto? Annalee? No. I teach the children, it should be me if this is real and they will be going to someone else." She hums softly, her version of a laugh. "Who else would be able to recognize a proper education? Did you tell them when they might expect you, these boys and their keepers? If we could get the address, we might have a look sooner...sometime better suited to me." Tatters nods and relaxes, letting herself smile once again. "Um, my /idea/ was to minimize the number of people on the first trip; if they nab us then that sucks, but at least it's not like -- all three Knights and half our leadership or something. And we certainly won't decide to send children there after one trip - and I have, you know, a /job,/" she grins and waves around at...well, at the swirling darkness, but also the cavern in general, "and while I think Lily'd like to finish high school, it's February. She might just wait 'till next September. But," and with this she leans forwards, nodding definitely, "Snooping seems like a good idea." "We haven't set a date to visit -- Lily's gonna email 'em and see when she can get off work -- but I know where the place is. I used to live up thereish, knew it existed but not that it was mutantly. Um, it's in Westchester, though, it might take a bit of work to /get/ there." "No, no, never a good idea to rush. But better to look and know than to wait and see. We three...between us, should it go poorly, we stand a decent chance of escape. If they don't insist on a noon meeting. Blessed be the early onset of night in these months, mm?" Nox appears to steeple her fingers, or at least bring twisting lines of shadow together in an approximate steeple shape. "There is a train. I believe there is a train. Perhaps there is a train...oh, dear," she frets, "all of those miles. I could go quickly alone but it's far. A train would be better. Tunnels /ideal/." She sounds wistful. "I think there's a train! We can check. And um, they /should/ be cool with us asking to visit in the evening. I mean, Lily has work and stuff, and if they're mutant friendly they should understand about you? We'll let you know when we've heard back from them, I guess." Tatters nods, warming her hands by the heater and slowly reconstituting patches of epidermis while she talks. "I...don't think tunnels reach all the way out there. But again, we can check." "Perhaps if they're legitimate, we might /create/ tunnels." Still wistful. Nox does love her some tunnels. "It would make sense for exchanges. A route to sanctuary should the worst happen. But that is putting the cart before the horse, I know, I know. A visit. Strangers. Oh, why does everything happen at once? Is it a full moon, Tatters? It feels like it should be." She sighs out and with that, she loses her last grip on the corporeal--the gypsy skirt and sweatshirt deflate as Nox slides along the floor to puddle in the lee of the space heater. "How are your capillaries? Would you like a warm cup of water? We're out of tea and the coffee is on its third rebrew." "/Do/ we have the means to tunnel our way to Westchester? Huh. Um, water would be nice, thank you!" Tatters gives the reduced shadow of a woman a grateful smile, then adjusts herself in her seat and takes a long, steady breath, letting her eyes close once again as she...well, until she cracks an eye open and shrugs. "Uh no, I think it's crescenty. Can't remember if it's coming or going. I'll look that up too." And then it's back to reconstitution, for her. "Cart, horse," Nox says stoutly, or as stoutly as she's able. For now, she gathers the shreds of herself up and flows off in the direction of the canteen to appropriate water for the young Knight.