ArchivedLogs:Escaping Reality

Escaping Reality
Dramatis Personae Hive, Tag, Dusk	2013-03-19 The Collective gets +1 Tag.
Location <NYC> 403 {Hive} - Village Lofts - East Village
There's kind of a college-dorm feel to this place, though some of its occupants have left college behind. Entering the apartment finds visitors greeted by the perpetually messy living room, a mismatched assortment of couches and chairs (and milk crates) surrounding the wide table in the center. The wall holds a range of posters; some political, some sporty, some from video games, and a string of white lights strung over the kitchen doorway might be a holdover from Christmas. The kitchen adjacent is just as cluttered, its table unfit for eating due to its perpetual covering of books, papers, cereal boxes, projects; the fridge is usually sparsely populated. Ketchup. Beer. Not a lot of food. There are two bedrooms here, split between the four people; the fold-out couch in the living room (often folded out!) suggests that at least one of them does not actually claim a room as their own. It's evening on Tuesday and that means Game Night! Or... okay, it /usually/ means Game Night. Tonight it means Dusk is sitting around the house, shirtless as he usually is when at home so that his wings can /flex/. Flicker, still recuperating from being half-melted to death by acid-dragon, is sleeping, although he /has/ at least been intermittently mobile again now. Ian is nowhere to be seen, but then, he often isn't. At the moment Dusk is draped sideways into an armchair, wings hooked over one arm and his legs dangling over the other, a laptop on his lap that he's currently glaring at. There should be some game set up! There should be snacks. There should be /people/. But tonight none of these, only -- glaring. The figure haunting the rooftop wears a jacket dominated by two dense black grids that ghost colors in twisting curves of moire. Tag's hair is snow white and hangs down almost to his collar, his face pale, eye sockets sunken. He finally selects a fire escape and climbs down, pausing at each level to peer in a window until he found the right one. With a few quick raps, he opens it and starts climbing in without waiting for someone to answer. "I know there's a lot going on but my phone died and there's a lot of people at Mel's place and I thought maybe you needed a--" He stops, one leg dangling over the casement. "--hand. Hey Dusk...where's Hive?" Dusk's head turns sharply at the knock at the window, but seeing Tag he doesn't bother to get /up/. He just watches Tag climb in, a smile starting to curl his lips but it dies in infancy at the question. "Hive -- oh. Hive's not home," he says, with a deepening frown, "Did -- oh. Your phone died. Jax didn't tell you then." His hand lifts, scrubbing thin fingers through his dark hair. "Er. Sorry. Game night's cancelled." The question might draw a frown from Dusk but that is not the only thing it draws. There's a quiet mental /press/, at Tag's mind, at the sound of Hive's name. It licks against the other man's mind like /tasting/ it, lapping up surface thoughts in /curious/ inquiry. "I was hoping I might run into Jax, too," Tag admits, swinging his other leg inside, hopping down to the floor and closing the window behind him. "I've heard five different versions of what went down..." << Which is why I got stoned out of my mind and passed out for a while. Mondays are overrated anyway. >> "Can I just hang here for a while? Home's sorta...like how it was here last week." "Jax isn't -- I mean, things've been kind of stressful for him, too. And no game night. I don't think he'll be here. You could check downstairs, though," Dusk suggests brightly, "I bet he'd be pretty thrilled to see you -- uh. Are you alright, man? You kinda look, well, like shit." He swings his legs down to the floor, wings flexing as he stretches. "Hungry?" He gestures to the couch with one hand. "Welcome to crash. Been quiet as shit around here /anyway/ with everyone cleared out." The mental touch probes deeper, at that thought. A brief foreign feeling of /concern/ washes over Tag, as this is examined, probing at Getting Stoned Out Of His Mind in rather less idle investigation: Recreationally STONED? Self-medicate-y STONED? Habitually STONED? Poke. Pokepoke poke. Tag wanders over to the couch and falls over onto it. "Pretty hungry, yeah..." he replies, though it sounds muffled because his cheek is pressed against the cushion. "I kind of had coffee for breakfast today, if it still counts as breakfast when you have it at 5PM." << A slideshow series of memories: hating himself for not being of any use, hitting up one of the punks for weed, narrowly avoiding Jason, wandering through the City in a haze, contemplating the trains--it would be so easy to leave again--going home, failing to help look after the guests, almost setting the kitchen on fire, passing out in a chair. >> "I feel funny," Tag mutters, sitting up again with an effort. "Are you /sure/ Hive isn't here?" "Hive's getting deported." This is flat and tired. Dusk gets up, padding over to the kitchen to poke through the fridge. "Remind me, are you a hippie cow-hugger, too? All Jax and Ryan's friends, I can never remember." He turns to look over his shoulder at Tag, frowning deeper. "You /look/ funny. You gonna hurl? There's a trashcan." << Not good, >> whispers into Tag's mind, and it sounds entirely /un/like Hive usually does. Usually Hive's mental voice is a painful /sledgehammer/ to the mind; this voice is soft and gentle, but also -- kind of uncannily /many/ voices together. A chorus of different people with a rippling undercurrent of thoughts and feelings that are /there/ enough to be background whitenoise but muted enough to not /really/ be able to pick out any one clearly. << Stay. Don't leave. >> "Deported?!" Tag bolts completely upright now, then winces and rubs his temples. "I didn't know it was /that/ bad! I don't hug cows why would I...OH! I'm vegetarian when I can pull it off, but I'll eat whatever, except for liver 'cuz that's just kinda gross and no I'm not gonna be sick like that anyway I don't think." << Hive? I won't go, but your sound balance is all...echoey. Is that because you are far away? Please don't get deported! >> A cool minty green color creeps into Tag's hair from the tips up each tress some kind of magical dip-dye. "Dad," he breathes. << My dad's boss /knows people/ in immigration services. But he's a bad man. But I don't want you to get deported! >> "Deported. And Ryan's in jail. And Jax's kids got taken away. These people have it out for them bad." Dusk doesn't really specify /which/ people but given the number of traumatized refugees milling around lately, well. "We're looking for a good lawyer or -- someone to sponsor his visa or -- /something/ but it's. We don't know. He'll be back in Thailand if we're not quick." << Far away? >> Hive echoes this concept slow and a little confused. << No, we're right here. >> And there's another mental /press/, gentle this time, cautious-curious. << You're not well, >> comes with an echo of the same images of the past few days he'd just picked up from Tag. << Take care of yourself. >> The mention of /dad/ just makes him go rooting around /there/, instead. Poking at memories of DAD. << Bad man, >> he echoes with oddly ready agreement. << We don't want it, either. This is home. >> /Home/ comes with images. Not New York but its people. Flicker. Dusk. Ian. Jax. The twins. Ryan. Melinda. Shelby. Jim (somewhat crankily.) Micah's there, too. So is Tag. "But they can't..." Tag starts, then stops because he knows 'they' can. He slumps back against the couch. "My sister's /almost/ a lawyer. Does that count? And my dad /knows people/..." << That's how we got to come here... >> The word "Dad" becomes "Dieh", which becomes "Baba", a scrawny, sad-eyed man carrying little Tsai-Hong on his shoulders through the busy streets of Shanghai. Baba knew things about people; it made him unpopular. He kept getting fired. Then the new boss, the suits, the expensive gifts, the hushed talk of relatives and neighbors, the plane ride to the States. He only pieces it together then, why he could never hide anything from his father. << Home? Home is /us?/ That is... >> The green of Tag's hair bleeds down into seafoam over his torn and inexpertly woven t-shirt. << ...SO COOL! Why'd you tell me it was all scary and stuff? >> "Be nice if it counted," Dusk says, with a small smile. He goes back to digging through the fridge, frowning and turning up some eggs. Cheese. "Eggs?" he offers. "It's basically all we have except, uh, beer and potato chips." << Home is -- >> This time not images but just a feeling, warm, caring, belonging. << Scary? What is scary? >> This sounds puzzled. Hive is still idly poking at those memories of Tag's father, of Tag as a child, but lets it drop with a quiet: << Maybe your father is scary. >> "I would love some eggs," Tag replies, staring blankly at Dusk's beautiful wings. << It's kind of strange casually discussing food with someone who's um...I'm not sure what you call this exactly? Are we /Borg?/ You told me when we first met it would hurt and was terrible. >> Tsai-Hong stares back at Tag-and-Hive from a dirty mirror. He has cut his hair short with scissors too big for a six-year-old's hands. Baba stands behind him in the doorway, but does not berate him. << He's not really scary. He just wanted what's best for us...and got it all wrong. I forgive him. Maybe he can help. /Someone/ has to help. Can't you just Assimilate people and make them let you go? >> Dusk sets about eggmaking. Cracking a few. Whisking them together with some salt and pepper and milk. "What /have/ you been up to, dude?" His wings flex. They flex a lot, restless, folding against his back, shifting as he navigates the small kitchen space. "You seem a little under the weather?" << This isn't Borg. Do you want to be Borg? >> Hive sounds almost /hopeful/. There's a little /tugging/ at Tag's mind. << People make hard choices. For their families. We could take them, >> he agrees as an afterthought, << We could take everyone. But not forever. >> This admission is reluctant. Maybe he would /like/ to Borg everyone forever. "Doing drugs and sleeping because I can't deal with reality," Tag blurts, cringing. "Sorry...but it's pretty much true. I'm make bad decisions. It's like my only talent...other than colors. I'm glad they didn't find some excuse to drag you away somewhere, too." << Will it help? If it'll help, then Assimilate me or whatever, because I'm useless like this. >> He kicks off his sneakers--gray up until a moment ago, now hunter green--and pulls his feet onto the couch so he can rest his chin on his knees. << Who's "they?" I wanna...I dunno what, exactly. Maybe make them clash really bad. >> Then, suddenly vicious. << Or make their corneas opaque! How dare they hurt my friends?! >> This outburst doesn't seem to /surprise/ Dusk, though it does earn a worried look. "Reality's pretty shitty," he agrees. "You need to escape it now and then, you can crash over here. It's quiet now that, uh, the house full of refugees is gone." He drops butter into a pan, continues his whisking as it melts. "Ian and I stayed home from this latest raid." That comes with a bit of a /guilty/ look, but only a small one. "M'sure they'll come for all of us eventually." He shrugs, more through his large wings than through his shoulders. << It may help -- >> Hive murmurs, though the /sentiment/ that comes with this is more of helping Tag than helping himself, brushing back over last-couple-days memories with a worried touch. << They -- they're all they. >> Images flicker here in quick succession; the labs they broke into, the squad of SWAT team coming to bang down Ryan's door, the ICE officers taking Hive out of his apartment. << You're never useless, >> is softer, but sincere. << We're sure we could find people who could do with some blinding. >> At this /we/, here, there's another push. This time it's stronger. A heavy sharp thrust into Tag's mind, it comes with no small measure of disorientation; Tag's mind /fills/ with those other voices, no longer whispering but clamoring in a host of distractions and worries and irritations and joys and all the tedious minutiae of Many People's everyday lives. And Hive, tired-stressed-scared, somewhere far away in a cell uncertain where he will be by this time next week. There's a moment when Tag might not be in the living room at all, but looking through Hive's eyes instead at nothing more interesting than a blank wall, prison-bland dinner untouched on his lap. And then it's gone and Tag is back in Hive's apartment, with a chorusing clamor of voices and feelings that take a while to subside back into quiet WhiteNoise. << But first we eat. >> Here Tag's eyes lift, guided by Hive's control, back to Dusk and his wings and his cooking.