ArchivedLogs:Newsworthy

Newsworthy
Dramatis Personae Hive, Mirror
In Absentia	2014-04-07 Part of Perfectus TP
Location <NYC> Montagues - SoHo
Montagues harkens back to the day when SoHo was filled to the brim with artists, with its mismatched furniture, all plush and decorated heavily with carved wood, but remains trendy enough to keep its newer patrons by making sure that furniture is clean, in good repair and inviting. The antique tables all have been reinforced to seem less creaky. The real draw of the cafe is the smell: fresh roasted coffee mingles with perfectly steeped teas. Spices from crisp pastries mingle with the tang of clotted cream but don't overwhelm too much the scent of chalk on the menu boards. It's early in the morning, a breakfast rush at Montagues. The line is long, wending off towards the door, but with the majority of patrons here to grab a quick bite or caffeine before work there's still a surprising number of tables free. Hive isn't in line -- he's slumped in against a table, a cup of coffee untouched in front of him and his head buried against his folded hands. He looks, really, pretty much like he's asleep, though even with posture gone slack and eyes closed there's a keen alertness to his mind, open to the chaotic morning-rush cocktail of other minds around him. One mind slipping in to the coffeeshop is familiar, in multiple layers. Joshua's thoughts at the moment are a cluster of tired, exhaustion layered over a busy sense of having to organize his time today and not really knowing where to /start/ and oh /god/ does he ever need caffeine. Mirror's mind beneath that one is quieter, cooler, a level-calm tick-tick-tick that purrs along neatly and -- stops. Thoughtfully fluttering a quiet recognition, quiet /greeting/ towards Hive. Even as outwardly Joshua just tucks himself into the long line, shoves hands in the pockets of his camo jacket, rocks up onto the toes of his boots in restless /despair/ at the wait. << The hell have /you/ been. >> This comes bludgeoning-thudding into Mirror's mind in response to the greeting; it's tired and it's /aching/throbbing with a jackhammering headache and it's /cranky/. And it's worried, sick-stressed beneath the pain and exhaustion. << Your whole fucking apartment vanished, we've been goddamn -- calling and. >> He goes silent after this. << ... Guess you all got out just in time. >> << Did vanish, >> Joshua's voice acknowledges, << juuust in the nick of time. I, >> comes in mental flavourspeak, << (we) >>, << was there, you know. Half the medics in the fucking city got mobilized for /that/ shit. >> His hands stay in his pockets, weight settling back into a slow heavy patience as the line inches forward. << Parley skipped town. >> In Joshua's voice this is just delivering information, impassive and /unsurprised/; beneath it the quiet-cool tick of /Mirror's/ mind grows briefly -- sharper. Angrier. Hurt? -- almost. But then subsides into quiet almost too quickly to catch. << No leads, sadly. Or too /many/. /Everyone/ wanted someone in your building dead. >> << Did he. >> There's already too much stress and weight and sick-unhappy in Hive's mind for one note /more/ to really be felt, a dewdrop added to the midst of a /hurricane/. << Was wondering -- stopped giving input on finishing his. Your. House. >> He still hasn't lifted his head, buried in his folded arms. << Yeah. /That/ hasn't ended. Been some kidnappings. >> In his mind this comes with other connotations. Maiming. Murder. Mirror!Joshua slides along further towards the counter. << /Really/. >> The flutter of interest that this perks in his mind does come coupled with a flutter of worry. The connotations rather than the words are floated back towards Hive -- Maiming? << I've seen lots of news -- >> Mutilated bodies, dismemberment. His arms cross over his chest. << Yes. That. Kid at the pups' school, lopped his arm off. Dusk got nabbed, now. >> Now it's more like a /torrent/ pouring in among the hurricane. Maybe noticeable. Still overall drowned-out. Hive turns his face in against the crook of his arm. << Friday morning. There's some creepy fucking cult taking them. Purporting to heal people. Make 'em better. But they're fucking -- taking mutants and -- >> Here there's a borrowed image, stolen from Micah's mind, a young woman with /Dusk's/ dark eyes looking out of her head. << Do you think, >> he wonders of Mirror, << that this is news? >> Mirror pulls hands from pockets, ambles up towards the counter as the line shrinks again. Through his head there's a wealth of thoughts. Sickened and then angry and then just /curious/, bright and inquisitive and a good dose of puzzled. Intrigued by how they're /managing/, exactly, by how this whole operation /works/. There's a heavy dose of that intrigue still churning through his mind by the time he has a coffee and a croissant-egg-cheese sandwich and meanders back over to drop down heavily into the seat across from Hive. "I think," he agrees out loud, stretching out a leg to /nudge/ Hive in the knee, wake him /up/, "that this is worth talking about."