ArchivedLogs:Food Fairies

Food Fairies
Dramatis Personae Ion, Kay, Micah, Rasheed, Isra
In Absentia	18 October 2013 Supply runs continue!
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. Like so many of the Lofts apartments, the BoM safehouse is kind of a /swarm/ of people lately -- largely those least in need of active /care/ or guidance have been shepherded over to here or farther out to Isra's apartments; those old enough or in Prometheus custody for /short/ enough to have less problem reintegrating into the world. But they're still in need of food and supplies and places to sleep while they find their ways back to their old lives, and so! Crowded. Through all of this Ion has been an EXUBERANT burst of presence, offering a hand in the kitchen, offering /advice/ on /all/ the best bars and restaurants to hit up with newfound FREEDOM. Offering an ex-labrat's-eye-view of the city. At the moment he's in the kitchen, though between mealtime this isn't so much helping-out as it is perched-on-the-counter, chatting. Beer in hand -- he's cracking it open to offer it to a young man standing nearby. /Important/ supplies, here. Kay stands long-legged and long-bodied alongside perchedIon, shit-kicker boots crossed at the ankles and his singed, beat-up old kutte sporting the MMMC (1%, thank you very much) patch proudly over a worn out once-black-now-gray shirt, jeans, a black bandana tied around one bicep. His lank blond hair is currently being shoved to the side while he leans down to show off the scar beneath it, where they'd CUT HIM LOOSE, as he's loudly explaining. And making stabbing-gouging-SLICING gestures. And one or two that looks like he's pantomiming ICE-CREAM SCOOPING. There is a knock-knock-knock at the door in three sharp raps. A Micah stands on the doorstep, accompanied by an Isra, his torso criss crossed with the straps of various reusable grocery bags. Beneath the bags is an olive green canvas jacket, worn open over a black Reading Rainbow-dash T-shirt and a pair of faded jeans, patched also in rainbows. A greenish-brown newsboy cap is perched atop his head of tousled auburn hair, which peeks and pokes out from under the hat haphazardly. It's Rasheed who ends up answering the door; he's been here mostly today just to talk. See who needs either /his/ services directly or those of his clinic -- the /social/ workers there are largely probably going to be the most help, both in terms of therapy and in terms of navigating the mounds of paperwork needed to return to normal life. "Oh. hello, thank you. Food all through --" He automatically turns to lead the way back into the kitchen, mouth quirking up just slightly at Kay's animated retelling. "It isn't quite so exciting as all that," he murmurs, with a touch of amusement. "We don't stab so much as, ah. Excavate." Dressed in an odd but elegant combination of dark amethyst kurta and black twill riding skirt, Isra is playing packgargoyle beside Micah. Though she is strong--muscles plainly visible beneath gray skin--the massive wings sprouting from her back make carrying her load a bit awkward. She has several canvas grocery bags slung over each shoulder, wings mantled to keep them steady, and a large plastic snack carrier in her taloned hands. "Excavation /can/ be exciting in itself, I have been given to understand." She bobs her horned head at Rasheed by way of thanks and enters with Micah, tail swishing to maintain her balance as she walks. "I am not sure where all this food came from. We might have to rethink the laws of thermodynamics and conservation of matter to account for it all." "S'like the man said," Ion is including Rasheed in this conversation now with an arm reached out to /sling/ over Rasheed's shoulder once he's near enough, "/excavation/, it's like. An entire /dig/ inside your head. Buried treasure. Ancient relics. This doctor, yeah, he knows his /stuff/." His chin tips up in a jerk of hello to Isra and Micah. "Food," he informs Kay helpfully. "Comes from the food fairies." He's indicating /Isra/ with that. What, she has wings. "Yeah, man, this dude's just being /modest/," Kay extends a long arm to clap a hand warmly against the side of Rasheed's neck, giving the guy a jostling. His skin is feverishly, ominously warm as ever, like a bomb just shy of going critical - a bomb that's grinning! "This guy's a god damn /skull/ spelunker. You should see his equipment, s'got a pick axe and a one of those helmet-fucking-things with the light on top? Like mother fucking Indiana-Brain-Jones. In and out, or your money back." The poor kid they're all bragging to is now very wide-eyed and kind of smiling, if also a little /anxious/. WHUP, Kay comes away from the counter to swat at Micah's hat (cattoy!) giddily and then full on THROWS his arms (or well, inteds to) around Isra with a crack-voiced sound of delight, "You STOLE it didn't you!" He'll give her all the credit. If he's managed to get this far, he'd actually be trying to sweep her up off her feet and spin her but she's - probably a little heavy. So he just GRUNTS horribly. Against her! Happily! “Dr. Toure!” Micah greets, the exclamation half surprise and half just pleased to see the man. “It's good t'see you. Thank /you/ for bein' here. I know your time is precious.” He slowly lugs his heavy bags along to the kitchen, giggling as his hat is knocked off by a Kay-swipe. He doesn't even attempt to retrieve it just yet. “Oh, yeah. The food in packagin' is from shoppin' trips an' donations. The thousand containers of prepared stuff in the cheap Tupperware is... Um. I kinda was hangin' around up here when the whole team went off an' /maybe/ cooked for about ten hours straight. On account of I couldn't sit still.” A faint blush dusts across his cheeks, his expression slightly sheepish, as he unloads the bags onto counters and even the kitchen floor once that space is used up. “Ion!” Yeah, he's not getting away with that little chin-tip of greeting. It's the first time Micah has seen the man since he disappeared from the church in Harlem. Quit of his many bags, he /pounces/ at Ion for a hug. "It does help, doesn't it," Rasheed answers Micah's relation of his cooking frenzy, "Having something to occupy your mind while --" His eyes sweep the room, the crowd of gathered refugees. "Ah -- no pick-axe," he contradicts this /colorful/ description of his work, his lankybony frame easily jostled between the other two men. "Though there is a --" He gestures towards his head. "Light. -- We should be ready," he tells the wide-eyed young brainchippee, "next week to start. Let you all get back to your lives, I know this is nerve-wracking." He looks over Isra with a small tug of smile. "I -- /believe/ there has been some funds allocated for feeding everyone --?" He maybe looks a little dubious at the thought of Isra /sneaking/ around to shoplift. "/He's/ the food fairy." Isra indicates Micah with a tilt of her head--everything else is occupied. "Magic /would/ make all of this a bit more plausible. Any sufficiently advanced technology, I suppose--or sufficiently determined effort." When Kay tackles her, Isra is too startled to warn him she is top-heavy in addition to /generally/ heavy. The box she is carrying gets handed off to the nearest unengaged arms, which belong to Rasheed. Huge, leathery gray wings flare out by reflex, then quickly retract, but not before smacking into something--a trash can, perhaps--and knocking it over. Balance regained and hands free, Isra grins a sharp-fanged grin and sweeps /Kay/ off his feet. "Indeed! We are such clever thieves that we replaced the food with money when we acquired it, so that no one would notice anything was amiss." She hefts him once and sets him down along with the bags, gaining back several inches in height as she sheds the weight. "There were donations, yes." This toward Rasheed. "Certainly, though, it pales in comparison to donated time and skill--Doctor...Toure?" She extends a long-fingered hand. "Isra al-Jazari." "Gave them your money, pff, you're doing it /wrong/. You stick with me, I'll teach you, yeah?" Ion smiles a bright smile at this, and leaves off his Rasheed-jostling in order to open his arms wide, welcome Micah with a tight hug, dropping down off the counter to /lift/ the other man off his feet and then set him back down. "Eyyy, boy. For someone who took all those /bullets/ in you you look pretty spry!" He says bullets like he's saying Micah won a /prize/? "Oh, shit-shit!" Kay's ratty smoker's tenor cracks like a schoolboy when Isra hoists him up, legs briefly bicycling, with a strangled laugh and then just goes LIMP, commenting to the others over a shoulder, "Man, can you imagine Issy going at it? She could fit half a fucking convenience store under these badass wings alone. A loaf of bread for a little junk in the trunk, some /melons/ down the front.” He demonstrates by CLAPPING his hands against his chest, RIGHT where melons would go. Micah /eeps/ slightly when he is suddenly lifted off his feet, though he squeezes Ion every bit as hard in return. “It was /one/ bullet. An' it didn't even stick around. S'prob'ly stuck in the stairs back at the church somewhere.” His hand goes reflexively to his right flank, cupping over the spot where his wounds no longer exist. “Not gonna lie, though, I was pretty well hobbled for over a week, there.” He giggles when Isra accuses him of food-fairy status. “Ohgosh. I think she might've just stolen me one of /Jax's/ rightful titles with that one.” Kay's rather exuberant demonstrations darken his blush from soft shell-pink to a light red. "There can be more than one fairy in the world." The thievery-talk just puts another small twitch at Rasheed's mouth, his head giving a small shake. "I'm sure those wings have many benefits." He takes the box from Isra, turning in kind to deposit it onto the counter. He takes Isra's hand afterwards. "Toure, yes. Rasheed Toure. A pleasure." His eyes track back to the living room, and he excuses himself not with any formal goodbye -- they're all likely to be working together fairly often in the coming days, after all -- but a simple small nod as he melts off away, to continue his work. "Fairies and thieves." Isra snickers and shakes her head at Kay. "This is beginning to sound like one of those roleplaying games Dusk so loves." Then, to Micah. "It is not so much a title as a description, besides..." Her pointed ears perk forward and her hairless eyebrow ridges lift in an expression that she probably meant as mischievous but somehow looks more predatory. "...it can be a /competitive/ title, too, one which Jax will no doubt seek to reclaim soon enough." She settles her wings down across her shoulder and stoops to right the--fortunately lidded--trash can she had struck. "Speaking of which, we /had/ better run by the store. Tag handed me a list as he blazed through the room before we left..." "Ey, if you all want to have a competition for plying us all with the best food --" Ion's hands spread wide in front of him once he has put Micah back down. "I don't think anyone here is going to give you complaints about that. Bring it on. We'll," he claps Kay on the shoulder, here, heavily, jostling him with fingers pressing down against flesh, "even volunteer to judge." Magnanimously. Kay takes the shoulder-clap like a MAN, rocking briefly to one leg before they both support him once more. He's grinning with about a million tobacco-stained teeth, rubbing his hands together, "I'm a great judge. I will judge so hard your /GRANDPARENTS/ will feel it." Abruptly, he hops forward, stooping over with a leg thrown out behind him in counterbalance to retrieve Micah's hat. "Y'want an escort?" To /grocery/ shop? He will guard ALL the food. "I can leave /cholo/ here to hold down the fort til we get back." “Ohgosh, if this turns into a competition, Jax's got it all wrapped up. He can actually /bake/.” Micah looks thoughtful for a moment. “Unless, of course, you /really/ want somethin' with meat or dairy in it. Then I win by default.” He nods acknowledgement of Isra's errand reminder. “Yeah, we gotta be out t'shop /more/ for the Lofts crew. I think maybe we just need t'own a grocery store at this point. Direct delivery. No middle man.” He reclaims the hat from Kay with a quiet thanks. “You're certainly welcome t'tag along. Never hurts t'have more folks t'carry bags.” His head tilts in the direction of the door, to indicate that leaving should happen soonish. "I should outsource my baking to Happy Cakes just to give him some competition." Isra seems entirely sincere. "As well, I could inquire after a direct delivery arrangement with my cousins, if you believe it would be more efficient than our current scheme, such as it is." She casts an appraising glance over Ion and Kay, nodding, tapping her chin with the wicked talon of her index finger. "This /would/ be a good opportunity to improve food fairy status." Wings unfold her from shoulders, rustle out loosely behind her as she half turns to go. "Shall we?"