ArchivedLogs:Best Laid Plans

Best Laid Plans
Dramatis Personae Dusk, Regan, Micah
In Absentia	25 December 2013 Assassination plot details... (Merry Christmas?)
Location <NYC> BoM Safehouse - Lower East Side
Tucked away off a little-used side street in the Lower East Side, sandwiched between a youth drop-in center and a taqueria, this narrow three-story townhouse has very little to catch the eye. Boarded-up windows, a door peeling its paint, shabby grubby brickface; from the outside it does not look like much. Inside someone has gone to great lengths to renovate the building into something more habitable. It isn't glamorous but it is comfortable, old furniture dragged in, the place generally swept clean. The first floor holds a large living room, a smaller dining room, a spacious kitchen, a half-bathroom. There are three bedrooms and a full bathroom on the second floor; the attic is just a large empty space crammed full of boxes with a window out to the large flat roof. The basement, much like the attic, consists of a lot of empty space. A bare concrete floor, no windows, occasional poles running up to the ceiling. A tiny half-bathroom down here, too. Not a whole lot else. The city is quiet, Christmas morning. A lot of people home with their families, a lot of people at church, an overwhelming portion of businesses closed down. The safehouse has been somewhat haphazardly decorated. A string of lights here, a wreath there, a -- plastic jack’o’lantern. Shiny green four-leaf-clovers. Downstairs there are people, there are /often/ people lately; various stray mutant children, a couple itinerants passing through, a pair of women just trying to get in from the cold. There’s coffee brewed in the kitchen and a large pan of scrambled eggs still warm on the stove; Dusk has a mug of black coffee and a plate of eggs, sprinkled with salt and pepper and a generous squirt of hot sauce. He’s not downstairs with the crowd but up in a bedroom with Regan, perched on the corner of the bed with his wings uncomfortably settling and re-settling behind him. He actually has a shirt on, today, striped green and white, and a grey hoodie over top with a cartoon penguin over the breast. “-- just yesterday,” he’s saying to Regan. “And Hive doesn’t have his soldiers anymore but he did for a /long/ ass time -- longer we wait, though the more dated that information gets.” Regan is standing by the window, in chunky knit turtleneck sweater, cream-coloured with a wide black stripe running near the bottom edge of body and sleeves. Blue skinny jeans tucked down into knee-high brown suede boots. Her hair is neatly French braided, her arms folding over her chest, and while /she’s/ been informed (or asked for permission, really) that it’s Micah she’s meeting with, Micah’s as yet only been given the location. Her eyes focus down on the street leading up to the front door, a look of some concentration on her face as for once she actively focuses on listening to the minds around her. “I’ve set a watch on his base. Attacking it directly would be ill-advised, but he leaves often enough to catch him in transit.” Micah can't help but look a little nervous. It's cold out yet again and he is dressed appropriately for the weather as he walks up the front stairs in his olive puffy coat, Jayne hat, candy-corn striped scarf, and green gradient striped gloves. The jeans that poke out from beneath the coat are in decently not-patched condition. He chews at his lower lip for a moment before reaching up to knock on the door. He rocks on his feet as he waits, weight shifting back and forth, hands fidgeting at the zipper on his coat. The door is opened in short order by a skinny teenage girl in patchy jeans and very oversized sweater, but she peers at Micah briefly and then closes the door again. A small flurry of conversation and thumping footsteps later, and this time it is Dusk who pulls the door open, looking a little apologetic as he beckons Micah inside with a wing. “C’mon. You want coffee? Eggs? That’s pretty much all there is right now.” He’s heading to the kitchen himself to top off his helping of /both/ these things, whether or not Micah also wants to partake. Freshly coffee’d and egg’d, he heads back up the stairs, boots heavy on the creaky steps. He doesn’t actually look particularly nervous but it’s there all the same in his mind, a frayed-edge kind of worry that is less concerned, really, with upcoming murder and more distinctly uneasy with involving /Micah/ in it. His thoughts are clear enough to read, though, to see that this unease has nothing to do with trust (/that/, he gives Micah unreserved) and everything to do with a sick clenching distaste for involving /good people/ in this enterprise. Upstairs, Regan doesn’t leave her post by the window, eyes slipping closed as Dusk slips off to fetch Micah. She has a coffee of her own, that she drinks only slowly, hands both wrapped snug around it as if for warmth. Her eyes stay closed with Dusk’s return, though there’s a wry whisper of mental speech that goes out to him: << Really, ridding the world of this creature is doing it a /favour/. >> “Hi, honey, thanks for this.” Micah gives Dusk a brief hug once he's inside and the door is closed. “Ohgosh, /both/ of those sound wonderful. Y'know I can never turn down eggs anymore. Jax's at church...time for eggs. Even if it isn't Sunday.” The smile that he gives is a little thin, still with a nervous edge. “Sor—I mean, it's unfortunate timin'. I hate burdenin' your holiday with this kinda thing.” Once he's been in long enough for a bit of the chill of the outdoors to wear off, he pulls off his hat and gloves, sticking them in one coat pocket, then tugs his scarf free and shoves it mostly into the other. Finally, he unzips the coat and slings it over one arm for carrying. “/You’re/ not burdening it with anything. I want my family safe. You’re not the one putting them in danger.” Dusk’s wing curls snug around Micah in a soft hug. He loads up a plate with a /generous/ amount of eggs and pours a fresh mug of coffee, letting Micah doctor these things as he likes with the rather basic assortment of condiments and milk and sugar that live here. His wing curls loosely around Micah once food is obtained, gently ushering the other man along upstairs. His wings fold in tight at his back once he returns to the bedroom, taking his seat again on the edge of the bed. << Yes. But it’s still the kind of favour that weighs pretty damn /heavy/ on people. And he’s -- >> His head gives a very small shake. “You two’ve already met plenty, I think.” << Not strong enough to shoulder it? >> Regan doesn’t raise her brows but her mental tone carries a heavy implication of it all the same. << Because he should leave now, if not. >> She turns towards the door, leaning back against the wall by the window with her cup of coffee, quietly scanning thoughts even as her eyes scan the arriving men. “We have. On several occasions, now. Good morning, Micah.” “I know. I just feel bad about...everythin', I guess.” Micah snuggles into the wing-hug. “Ohgosh, you're makin' up for all the eggs I'm usually not eatin' at once!” He manages a little chuckle, pausing to sprinkle salt and pepper on the eggs, to add milk and a little sugar to the coffee. He steals a little sip from the coffee mug before he is shepherded up the stairs. “Oh, oh...yes. Hi, Regan.” His voice has an odd tone with the greeting, not exactly surprise or disapproval, just an uncertain kind of /processing/. The whole situation is bizarre and vaguely unpleasant. “Thanks for helpin' me with...this...uh, problem.” << He’s strong. >> Dusk pushes his eggs around his plate with his fork. Not eating them, now, just swirling them into different configurations. “Think it’s kind of a problem for all of us. His /job/ is just to kill mutants. And he doesn’t really seem all that concerned with sticking to ones that are actively a threat.” His eyes skip from Regan to Micah. He takes a small sip of coffee before speaking again. “We know where he’s staying, though. It’s just outside the ci -- just north of the Bronx.” “I’m not sure thanks is appropriate. I may not have a spouse and children but the man has tried to kill my family as well.” Regan’s pale blue eyes fix thoughtfully on Micah. “I admit, though, I was a little bit surprised when Dusk told me it was /you/ with this request. You never struck me quite as the type to turn to such aggressive solutions.” She doesn’t sound particularly disapproving, either; more assessing. Micah takes a seat close to Dusk, balancing the plate on his lap and cradling the mug in his hands. “Good...we at least know how t'find 'im. Did y'all have...any kind of plan for pullin' this off?” He blushes faintly at Regan's comment. “I'm just...accustomed t'thankin' folks when they help me with somethin'. An' I consider violence as a last option as a general rule, but...that'll tell you pretty precisely how many other options I came up with t'make this /stop/.” His head shakes, slow and steady. “I'm just no good with this kinda thing. Ain't never done nothin' like this before, so...I do need a lotta help t'stop me bein' completely lost. I just...couldn't ask somebody t'actually do it /for/ me. Ain't a fair kinda thing t'ask. 'Specially with any people with special abilities. If y'were t'get caught it'd be... It's the equivalent of askin' somebody t'put their life down for this, an' I'm not gonna ask somebody t'do that.” “There aren’t other options. It won’t stop,” Dusk agrees. “I mean -- HAMMER won’t go away even after he’s gone, but he won’t be /hunting down/ our -- your family in particular.” A small flush darkens his cheeks, and he he scoops a large forkful of eggs into his mouth. He’s quieter, that twinge of unhappiness returning when he asks, “What do you think would happen to you if /you/ got caught?” Regan’s lips twitch into a very small, brief smile. “Very Southern of you.” She shakes her head, looking for a moment at Dusk more than Micah. “We won’t get caught. He’s been staying at a small military facility outside New York. It’s certainly highly impractical to attack him /on/ HAMMER’s grounds. He leaves daily, though, always with a small escort. His guards, we can make sure are out of the way at the right time. And Rogers, he’s --” She looks to Micah and then down to her cup, small smile returning. “Only human. Are you at all capable with a gun, Micah?” Micah also eats his eggs, but in a picking and slow fashion, mostly out of politeness since he is a guest here than any remaining hunger. “Imagine I'd go t'jail for a very long time. But I'd be /alive/ at least. Wouldn't be the case for any of you.” He sips from the mug. “I'm glad t'hear you're confident, Regan, but...sorry, I'm still gonna make nervous-face at y'in the meantime. Ain't that I doubt your abilities none.” He chews slowly, regarding his plate before answering. “He ain't just...he took Nox's powers, an' we gotta keep that in mind, too. An'...not with handguns, which I imagine's more t'the design of what we need. I'm decent enough with huntin' rifles an' shotguns.” “Bring a lot of light. You should practice, though, you don’t want to get /close/ to this guy, you’re never going to be able to take him if it comes down to contact range. We learned --” Dusk frowns, tapping the tines of his fork against his plate quickly. “-- a lot of what we did about where he was staying because Hive was in the minds of his soldiers forever. But Hive’s /not/ anymore and we’re not -- asking him to get involved with any of this, so we need to act sooner than later because if he moves it’ll take us that much longer to pin him down again.” His wing slips out to rest lightly against Micah’s back. “I’d be a little worried about you if you /weren’t/ nervous.” “Her abilities were quite susceptible to light, yes? That shouldn’t be hard to contain, with some preparation.” If Regan’s nervous it doesn’t show, a thoughtful calm in her expression. “The weekend, then. Before more of his people return from holiday leave. Handguns are astonishingly simple. There’s a range we can go to, I’ll work with you between now and then. There /will/ be some of us -- necessary to make sure you get a clear opportunity with him unguarded. I’m reasonably good, though, at getting people around undetected.” “Yes, she was...very sensitive t'light,” Micah says with obvious sadness in his voice, a deeper twinge of it in his mind. “They used focused light an' spotlights against her. General high light in a room. The sun. Kept her contained usin' a collar and cuffs with lights in them.” He nods at the recommendation to practice. “I can do that. I was just hopin'...maybe y'all were able t'find a harder-to-track gun through not quite legal means? With all the confusion goin' on with the zombie outbreak, maybe somethin' turned up?” He presses into Dusk's wing. “Well, y'don't have t'worry at all then, 'cause I'm pretty crazy-nervous. Apologies for not givin' y'all more t'work with.” He sighs heavily down at his eggs. “Jax’d be good for that,” Dusk says, very wryly. He curls his wing further around Micah’s shoulders, rubbing slowly at the other man’s back. “And yeah. We can get you a firearm that won’t trace back to -- any of us, that part’s no problem. You gotta be ready to use it, that’s the real work. It’s --” He looks down at his plate, shoving the remainder of his eggs around again. “Not easy. No matter how much they’ve earned it.” “Mmm. Yes. With all the recent confusion.” Regan drains the last of her coffee, lowering the cup to the windowsill. “We’ll make sure you’re properly equipped, here, don’t worry. You’ll need to find time in the next few days to come practice. I can assure you Rogers knows his way around a firearm already.” Which draws her brows together in a small frown, before she adds like a small mental note to herself: “-- Some body armor, too. Which he’ll more than likely have as well. Just -- treat him like a zombie. Aim for the head. It will be best done in daylight -- he’ll be weaker, first, and we /want/ witnesses, moreover. Less of a hunt when there’s already many clear reports of just what happened.” “/No/,” Micah insists adamantly at the mention of Jax. “He's not getting' anywhere near /any/ of this.” He takes another large swallow of coffee. “I'll be ready. I'll...practice. Just won't make no appointments for work in the next few days. Ain't like many people are lookin' for 'em with the holiday an' all. An'...this is keepin' 'em from killin' my /family/, Dusk. Jax an' the twins an'...Spencer. I wouldn't even put that past...” He pokes at his eggs with his fork. “Witnesses.” The colour drains from his face. “How're...we gonna...do that? In a way that isn't the opposite of what we want?” “I know. I know. I don’t -- /actually/ want him near this, either.” Dusk’s face takes on a deeper flush as Micah’s pales. He scoops the last of his eggs into his mouth, swallowing quickly. “It’s what we want,” he says quietly. “It’s -- the biggest reason I think, nobody ever got far in. Finding /me/. Because there were a fair number of people who saw exactly what happened, and I certainly had nothing to do with it.” Regan just tips up a hand, fingers uncurling towards Dusk. Except now it’s /not/ Dusk, sitting beside Micah; it’s a starkly different stranger, taller, rangier, lank blonde hair and a scattering of dirty blond stubble on his sallow face. “Witnesses,” she says again quietly, “to paint a very clear picture in the aftermath. It’s really just down to what story we want to construct. But.” A moment later the whole /room/ changes, no longer in a bedroom but in a busy New York street, not!Dusk and Micah perched on a bench at a bus stop with all the bustle and noise of a genuine city street flooding the air around them. “Whatever we /want/ people to remember happening, that’s what they’ll see. I did think Generic White Man was most appropriate last time around, they’re really least likely to incur public backlash. Or extra police harassment.” The room snaps back in a heartbeat to the quiet privacy of the bedroom. “Okay...okay. Wow, that's disorientin'.” Micah squeezes his eyes closed for a moment before opening them again. “As long as it's a fictional person, so's no one's really gettin' in trouble for it. An'...if there's some way t'have witnesses, but not put 'em in harm's way? I don't want nobody else gettin' hurt in the process an' guns are...they make that less of a guarantee.” He prods at the remaining eggs on his plate. “We're gonna have t'present more'n a face. They'll need a /story/ t'fill the narrative. /Why/ this non-existent person would be...shootin' at Malthus from a distance. Does he always look shadowy anymore? Like Nox did? Could frame it as an anti-mutant killin'. Those...happen often enough.” The prodding becomes more of a fierce /stab/ until the tines of the fork are dulled by eggy contents. “Just a fictional person, yeah.” Dusk sets his plate aside on the bed, washing down his eggs with a gulp of coffee. “... mine was a bar fight. I don’t think Malthus hangs out around bars, though. And cops /have/ to get involved in violence all the time. Jax didn’t --” His brow furrows uncertainly. “/Say/ anything about being shadowy, still.” “He doesn’t tend to frequent bars that we’ve noticed, no. But he /does/ hang out in less reputable neighborhoods owing to -- ah. After the incident in Harlem he was arrested and sentenced to community service. For destroying that church.” Regan shakes her head in answer to Micah’s question. “We’ve seen no evidence of him still using those abilities, but we can’t rule out that he has access to them. He looks human, though, now. Violence happens often enough in New York, though, especially these days. I’d suggest a zombie accident. He certainly wouldn’t be the first living person to be accidentally shot in an attempt to stop the dead. And it’s not /in/frequent to see them still, in some neighborhoods. And it’s hard, really, to ascribe any political motives to fighting that particular plague. Besides which if we’re lucky enough, the zombie will do some of your work for you.” Micah just listens and nods, finishing off the eggs because wasting food is not okay, and it gives him something to do with his hands anyhow. “Zombies...those're dangerous an' unpredictable, too. It's a good narrative if we can keep up the illusion /an'/ have everythin' enough under control t'prevent any accidental zombie-attackin' or /actual/ shootin' accidents with the zombies. Y'all think...y'can find one an' get it where we need it without too much trouble?” Dusk glances to Regan, his fingers briefly tightening around his cup. “Yeah, we can find one. I’ll make sure it’s where it needs to be. You just make sure Malthus gets dead. We’ll -- make sure it doesn’t hurt anyone else around. And that’s -- good, yeah. Zombies -- not a lot of real suspicion there lately. All New York’s kind of been dangerous and unpredictable.” His wing squeezes gently at Micah’s shoulders. “Just make sure /you/ stay safe, too.” “He’ll stay safe. We’ll be watching. You and everyone. Zombies are unpredictable, but they respond to my illusions as well -- I can’t control them, but I can guide them in the right directions. You’ll need,” Regan decides thoughtfully, “to be somewhat swift. I suspect Rogers will be more than adept at dispatching zombies /himself/. I can help with that, too -- make it look still moving even if he shoots it first -- but too much delay will get awkward. And these things -- if you’ve never done this before,” she says to Micah, almost gently, “there /will/ be an inclination to delay.” “I'll prob'ly be the safest of the bunch...I'll be the idiot with the gun /and/ stayin' back a fair bit. S'everybody else I'm worried about.” Micah drops his fork to the empty plate with a very light clatter. “I ain't never done this before, so...I won't be so dishonest as t'promise. But when we're drillin' for stressful situations, like with CPR, the trick is t'do it so often that your body can start workin' without thinkin' about it too much.” He swallows hard, dragging his eyes back up from the empty plate to look at Regan. “This place y'got t'practice in...how private is it? I think it might help, if I could borrow some of your time, t'work as realistic a setting as possible. If you'd be willin' t'do some of your illusions for me. Once I've gotten the plain ol' target practice done. Maybe to help work out some of the...reactions. Before it's actually happenin'.” Dusk downs the rest of his coffee in a quick gulp and lowers the mug to his lap. “Not thinking about it,” he agrees, eyes fixed on the empty cup, “definitely. Helps.” His wing rubs slow against Micah’s back. “Just a few more days. And this will all be over.” His eyes slip away towards the window. “Guess I’d better go round up a zombie or two in the next couple days, then. But we have,” his smile hooks upward thinly, a little tired, “a /crapton/ of Christmas to get through before then.” “Private. I can work with you. Realistic simulations. You’re right, it is good to get a feel first for what it might be like.” Regan tips her head in a nod to Dusk. “Yes. That would be excellent. I’ll keep surveillance on Malthus. Get equipment together. Scout the location.” She exhales a quick sharp laugh after this, rubbing fingers lightly against her temple. “Right. There’s a holiday happening, isn’t there. God, I’d say enjoy the day off but --” She hesitates, and shakes her head quickly. “No. I mean, /do/ enjoy it. Spend time with your family. I’ll take you out for practice tomorrow.” “Good...that's good. Know the location. Have our plan. Get a clear exit strategy so's we know everybody's gettin' away okay. Couple days t'practice.” Micah takes another few swallows of coffee to alleviate the sandpapery feeling in his mouth. “This is happenin'. Almost over... Should be home an' gettin' things ready before Jax is back from church. Thank you both...all. I don't know what I'd do without your help.” Dusk lifts his hand, squeezing gently at Micah’s shoulder. “Almost over,” he agrees softly. “And we’ll be right there with you.” His fingers squeeze in a little bit harder, and trail down against Micah’s arm as he drops his hand to the mattress. “I’ll meet you back at home, okay?” He turns his head, kissing Micah lightly on the temple. “Think I’ve got a little work to get done first.”