ArchivedLogs:There and Back Again

There and Back Again
Dramatis Personae Akihiro, B, Scramble
In Absentia	2016-07-01 "I've played by myself for too long."
Location <BOM> Front Porch - Main Lodge - Ascension Island
The front porch of the lodge unfurls its way across the entire front length of the building. Stained in a dark reddish finish, it seems to have been refurbished somewhat recently, the sturdy wood rather less weather-beaten than many of the buildings on the island. A half-height railing edges most of the porch, with a wide gated staircase centrally leading to the heavy front door, and ungated ramps at either side end. Protected from all but the most driving of rains by a sloped roof, the porch has been furnished with an assortment of furniture. Wicker rocking chairs, a pair of small square aluminum tables, a hammock at the far right end, a bench swing at the left. Despite the solid locks on the doors and windows, the front door holds a cheerfully flower-edged mat reading WELCOME. The rain falls hard and steady outside, utterly banishing any heat that might have lingered on from the blazing day and keeping most flying insects grounded. Water drips incessantly from the eaves of the porch like a moving beaded curtain, each drop glittering in the light as it falls. Scramble has been slouched in one of the rocking chairs for some time now, the earthy scent of weed still clinging to her, though she's only nursing a beer at the moment. She wears a cropped black tank top with a golden Tri-Force symbol printed in the center, black denim short shorts, and gold sandals whose gleaming straps wrap half-way up her long calves. Several golden bangles hang from her wrists, matching her gold hoop earrings. Every once in a while, she raises the bottle to her lips and takes a small, deliberate sip. Most of the flying insects, to be sure -- but right now one enormous metallic-blue dragonfly, huge and larger than horse-sized is droning downward from the sky, enormous veined wings thrumming in the air. She's soon followed by a light shining through the wet -- a gleam of blue-white coming off of the hovercycle that follows after her, disappearing under the trees. It's not long before a tiny blue shark -- dressed in bright yellow strappy tank and black handkerchief skirt, both soaked through and clinging to her skin -- is skittering out from under the shelter of the dark boughs to chase after the enormous dragonfly. Neither sharkpup nor dragonfly seem /overly/ fussed by the rain -- Sugar, anyway, is meandering slowly toward the porch, enormous eyes peering steadily through the bars of the railing at Scramble. Akihiro makes his way up onto the porch, letting out a tired sigh. Apparently the wetness hasn't stopped him from finishing the work he was doing on the new enclosure for the emus he's been taking care of. "Yo." he greets, raising his hand as he heads over to one of the rocking chairs. He's completely soaked, white tee clinging to his frame and jeans darker than they should be. So it's to one of the chairs he heads, tugging a metal case from his pocket. "Mind if I light up?" he asks politely, producing what appears to be a swisher mini. Scrambles eyebrows raise up when Sugar lands, but she doesn't seem /too/ concerned. She catches B's eyes, then tips her head in the direction of Sugar. "Am I bout to be dinner?" her tone is remarkably casual, all things considered. Then, glancing at Akihiro, "Go for it." Then, after a minute pause. "You must be Daken." B clambers up the railing once she's caught up to Sugar, hanging on the outside of it heedless of the sheeting rain still splashing at her from behind. "Might be. She hasn't eaten in a while." Hir eyebrows lift, head tilting slightly as hir enormous black eyes track over Akihiro. "Heard you were back." "I prefer Akihiro now." Akihiro informs Scramble with a nod and polite smile. Flame is touched to the end of his cigar, and it becomes clear very quickly that it isn't tobacco, instead a lemon scented kush. He takes a few hits before offering it to Scramble, asking with held breath "Wanna hit? Lemondrop kush and a gram dab snake." After a few quick moments the smoke is released, and he turns his gaze to B, "Been gone too long. Heard things have been crazy down here, how've you been?" "That's definitely not the way I thought I'd go," Scramble sounds rather philsophical about the prospect of her grisly demise, studying the dragonfly's compound eyes impassively. "Akihiro," she echoes. Nods. Then sweeps a hand down, palm-up, in front of herself, "Scramble. And no thank you, I am good." She leans on the 'good' just a touch, and has a visible struggle not laughing at this. "Shit's /always/ crazy in New York, but it's been a /year./" "Akihiro." B's brows pull together as she echoes this -- then nods. "Well. Welcome home." Hir elbows hookover the railing, toes tucked up onto the edge of the porch. Sugar follows after her in this posture-- a slow climb, one foot after the other, until she is halfway vertical and looking at the others over the top of the porch railing, now. B just shrugs a shoulder in answer to Akihiro's question. "Been up at college. Out of town. Things here are --" A pause, another shrug. "Where'd you disappear to, anyway?" "Up in the arctic circle. Had to clear my head, I was a major cocksucker. Trying my best to be a better man." Akihiro informs B with a small lift of his shoulders, puffing on the blunt a few times before he offers it out once more, this time to the shark. "How about you, wanna hit?" "Over winter, even?" Scramble blinks slowly at Akihiro. A grin spreads across her face. "Finding yourself in ice and snow and endless night. Most people don't /chill/ quite that literally." Takes a long pull on her beer. "Think it worked?" "Oh, I -- no, {thank you.} Smoking and I don't get along so good." Along the sides of hir neck, B's gills flutter briefly. "-- The arctic circle?" Hir brows hike upward. "That sounds -- unpleasant Did you find what you were looking for?" "I think so." Akihiro answers both Scramble and B, leaning back in the rocking chair to enjoy the blunt himself. "It wasn't fun, but it wasn't supposed to be. Worked out a lot of the things that made me crazy. And now I'm back. I imagine I'll be more enjoyable when I get over being single though. Just kinda here now." Scramble gives a soft huff of a laugh. "Well, glad to hear it worked out for you, at least in some way." She swishes the remainder of her beer around the bottom of the bottle. "Guess NatGeo-style trips can't solve all your problems. Sometimes you just gotta be present, enjoyable or not." "Get over being single? You don't mean Anette, do you?" One of B's eyes squints up uncertainly. "If I ever need to go find myself in the wilderness though I think I'd like to a least have a good time about it." Hir nose has crinkled up, chin dropping to rest on the rail. "S'way worse places to be than /here/." "At the rate I was going, I was gonna kill somebody. Probably Killian. It's ironic that that's who she's with now." Akihiro can't help but chuckle at the entire situation, knocking the cherry off his smoke and crushing it in his palm before returning it to the metal case. B gets a slight nod, "Yeah, she didn't take me leaving to get my head straight too well. Hooked up with Pedro, and now she's in a /relationship/ with Killian. What I get for being a child." Scramble's eyes crinkle only slightly as she watches Akihiro extinguish the ember on his skin. "Look, I don't know anything bout your Situation, but -- if fucking off for a year was what you had to do, that ain't /being a child/. It /is/, however, not unlike breaking up with someone, unless you talked it out real good beforehand." "I mean, yeah, most people would -- probably assume that vanishing for a year without so much as a postcard home means the relationship is -- done," B agrees slowly. "But also like. Maybe her being in relationships now doesn't have anything to do with you? S'possible you know," she suggests, "that she just likes Pedro and Killian and it had nothing to do with being messed up over /you/." "I'm not saying it did. I'm saying that because I vanished like I did she thought I was dead. Treated me like I was dead, mourned and moved on. I'm more sad that I hurt her like I did than the fact she found somebody else. I might not like Killian, but I'm grateful he was there when I wasn't." Akihiro explains, brushing the ash from his palm. "You know what I'm trying to say?" It's clear that for at least a little bit he's under the effects of what he smoked, though it's not as prominent as it was a few moments ago and is fading more with every passing moment. Scramble nods. "Heard you're kinda hard to kill, but -- you disappear without a word? Gonna hurt your relationships." She pauses, lifts her beer, "And I don't just mean the romantic ones. The Brotherhood's a family, after all. But you're back now." Her head tilts to one side, her eyes languid and half-lidded but fixed on Akihiro. "You plan on sticking by your brothers and sisters this time?" B is quiet, after Scramble's question to Akihiro. Her eyes fix steadily on the man. There's another ripple of hir gills, and a fainter tension that creeps into the set of hir muscles -- one that Sugar echoes, the enormous dragonfly leaning slightly further over the railing. "Regardless of what's to come." Akihiro seems sincere, "I've played by myself for too long. I've picked petty fights and done things that'd make Satan blush. This is my family. The only one I've ever had that didn't betray me. So you can bet your ass I'm sticking by all of you." Scramble inclines her head, the tug of her lips almost a lazy smile. "Well, in that case -- welcome back, Brother."