ArchivedLogs:How to Be Hazardous

How to Be Hazardous
Dramatis Personae Joshua, Tian-shin	2015-03-03 "Stabbing happens sometimes, though."
Location <NYC> {Funhaus} - Harbor Commons - Lower East Side
The house might have started out looking capacious and respectable, but it has since moved through various incarnations, always colorful, but never colorful the same way for longer than a few days. There is little in the way of what most people would call furniture: a sectional couch buried in fluffy cushions, three bean bags of varying sizes, a scattering of bookshelves, what looks like a human-scale cat tree in one corner, and a low, square table surrounded by zafus. The floor plan is largely open, criss-crossed by rope bridges linking small elevated platforms to the landing of the second storey, beyond which lie the bedrooms. The kitchen is separated from the living room only by a long counter, lined with stools. Even the appliances are decked out in unexpected hues, edged with designs that change on a daily basis. A row of tins and jars runs the length of the breakfast counter, none of which match and all of which bear brightly colored text describing their contents: teas, coffees, mates, and various herbal blends. Throughout the length of the Lunar New Year festival, Funhaus has gone through several color schemes, all heavy in red and gold. Presently, however, the walls looks somewhat more sedately decorated with plum trees in bloom. The dark brown of the trunks look stark against the snowy landscape, and pale pink petals drift down from outstretched branches. Goats of various colors cavort in the snow while dragons and phoenixes dance in the clouds above. In addition to the painted walls, a wealth of red paper lanterns hang from shelves, the second storey balcony, and the rope bridges spanning the living room. Scattered throughout the living room, several lotus-shaped bowls in vibrant rainbow colors hold oranges, persimmons, rice crackers, and candy in shiny metallic wrappers. It is mid-afternoon; on a Tuesday that means the Commons is fairly quiet. Lots of people at school. Lots of people at work. Joshua, in the middle of the afternoon, is on his couch, sprawled across all its cushions, lying under a soft red and gold blanket. He's in pajamas though it's well after lunchtime, thick fleecey green and black plaid pants and a grey tee with an FDNY sweatshirt unzipped over top. There's a bowl of rice crackers sitting on his chest. Maybe he's not eating them though, given there's also a pillow over his face. Tian-shin trudges down the stairs with Tag's notebook computer--identifiable from a great distance by the hypnotic swirls of bright colors that decorate its casing--tucked under one arm and a mug shaped like an oily green bamboo segment in the other hand. /Her/ pajamas, pale pink satin brocade, feature stylized plum blossoms. She wears her hair twisted up into a somewhat messy bun held in place with an automatic pencil. "I'm making tea," she announces, a bit groggily, "would you care for anything?" From underneath the pillow Joshua's voice is muffled. "Tlayuda." He drags the pillow off his face, hand falling down to thump (still holding the pillow) against the floor. "But in lieu of food caffeine will do. Sleep okay?" Tian-shin pokes her head into the refrigerator and hums thoughtfully. "You're a bit light on ingredients, but I can manage a decent facsimile. It might be a sort of a Chinese tlayuda." She pulls out some vegetables and a bag of tortillas and leaves them on the counter for the moment, turning her attention to the collection of tins. "Tea first, though. I slept...okay? Our mother kept me up most of the night lecturing me about...well, apparently Tian-yi told her what /actually/ happened. The part where I was a mutant, not the part where he almost sliced Tag's throat." Opens a tin and sniffs at its contents, puts it back in favor of another. "/You/ don't look like you slept so well." "Did /you/ mention the part where he almost sliced Tag's throat? Think she was lecturing the wrong damn person." Joshua leaves the pillow on the floor, dragging his hand up to dip it in his bowl of rice crackers. "So long as it's spicy, I won't complain. There was some hella Chinese-ish antojitos in Mexico City." His eyes scrunch back shut as he crunches into the rice crackers. "Eh," is his answer to the question of sleeping. "I did indeed mention it--in gruesome, lurid detail." Tian-shin scoops dark, curly tea leaves into a red ceramic teapot decorated with gamboling goats in broad gold brush strokes. "It upset her, but after all, Tian-yi /was/ drunk, and he probably didn't mean any harm, and anyhow Tag should not have provoked him, and I should have handled the situation better..." She heaves a long sigh and fills the pot with steaming water from the electric kettle. "Mom has always been like that with him--he's the baby /and/ the quote-only-unquote son." Leaving the tea to steep, she roots around in a cabinet and comes out with a skillet. "With Dad gone, she's gotten even more protective of him." She retrieves a few more items from the refrigerator. "You from Mexico City?" "Your family is really full of charmers." Joshua takes another handful of rice crackers when his first is gone. "How'd you and Tag end up not assholes?" His head shakes, the hard clench of his eyes relaxing. "Oaxaca. Not in the city." Tian-shin shrugs. "Well...Tag ran off, and I'm contrary." She blushes faintly and busies herself arranging her ingredients beside the cutting board. "Oh! I spent a semester in Oaxaca--exchange program. Such a beautiful city, surrounded by even more magnificent countryside." She strips down a head of Shanghai bok choy with practiced ease. "You ever go back to visit?" "Pretty fucking magnificent," Joshua agrees easily. His words come with a brief drift of mental imagery, lush tree-covered cliffside overlooking a lazy-winding river in the mountains. "Oh, yeah, practically every damn week, you think your ma gives you an earful you should hear my fucking Lita if I don't turn up too long. Thinks two days of silence means I'm in a cage somewhere." He sits up slowly, setting aside the bowl of crackers on a table. "You decided to be a decent person out of goddamn /bloody-mindedness/?" His mouth quirks up at the corner. "I was planning to visit my host family there just before the zombie apocalypse broke out." Tian-shin oils the skillet and puts the stove on low before turning to rinse the vegetables, raising her voice to be heard above the water. "Then after, well...life stayed crazy and I stayed unemployed. That isn't all that ridiculous a concern, unfortunately, what with the MRA, Prometheus, and all just the general pervasiveness of anti-mutant violence here." She wipes off her hands and hurriedly retrieves another cup to decant the tea. "I wouldn't have thought to put it that way, but basically? Yeah. Do you take anything in your tea?" "Uh. Caffeine?" Joshua shrugs. "Not very ridiculous. Labs got me a /couple/ times. And my family down in Arizona --" He shakes his head, teeth slightly clenched. "{My gran's had reason enough for worrying.}" The clench relaxes into a quick grin. "Still might've been a mistake to let her know about teleportation, though. Every. Damn. /Week/." Though in honesty, he doesn't sound particularly put out. "... You want to visit?" His brows lift. "I fly cheap." "Caffeine it is." Tian-shin brings over one of the cups, also bamboo segment-shaped, though sort of an iridescent metallic purple in color. "It's the Golden Monkey, and I steeped it fairly strong." She casts about for a coaster in vain, then just sets the cup down on the end table anyway. "You've been in there more than once." Not a question. Dark brown eyes blink down at him hugely. "I can't really imagine how awful it must have been, but I'm sure a lot of people, in your position, would go back to Oaxaca and stay." << Oh! Stove. Food. Stay calm don't /do it/ again. >> Darting back to the kitchen, she starts assembling her improvised tlayuda. "{Er, yes, I would love to go with, sometime. Haven't seen my friends there in years.}" "Yeah. They kind of came back specific for my roommates and I." Joshua shrugs a shoulder, dipping his head in a nod of thanks as he takes the tea. "And, fuck, I mean, we've /all/ been back plenty -- you know. Armed and pissed the fuck off. But that's different than /in/-there-in-there." Another shrug. "You'd be surprised. There are a lot of people in my position. My team hasn't run. Lot of them could." Still holding the cup, he gets up, slowly. Follows after Tian-shin toward the kitchen, leaning against the counter to watch the food-prep. "You calm?" His voice is calm. His brows hitch up. "I'm not about to stab anyone, if that helps." Tian-shin shakes her head, nearly unraveling her less-than-carefully bound hair. "Good riddance to Prometheus, but I'm sure there are plenty of people complicit in those atrocities still out there, still willing to do ill." She chases the onions around the skillet with a spatula, a little more forcefully than altogether necessary. "Plenty more who didn't give a damn what was going on in those labs, who wouldn't have lifted a finger to stop it even if it were in their power." Palpably /not/ calm now, she sighs. "Not really? But I think power only activates involuntarily when I panic, which is not reassuring." She allows a sheepish smile at Joshua over one shoulder. "But yes, it helps. The lack of stabbing. Stabbing happens sometimes, though, and I'd prefer to react to it in a more controlled way than just..." Her hands make a sweeping, billowing gesture. ".../poof/, poison!" "It's harder to give a damn when you don't see it. There's atrocities going on all over. I'm not working to stop most of them. If I'd never been in the labs, maybe I /would/ be in Oaxaca." Joshua's arms fold on the countertop. His weight leans down against them, fingers tucking in against the loose folds of soft sweatshirt. "Poof? Is that the technical description of how it works?" "I mean even /after/ it was blown wide open." Tian-shin scrapes the pile of vegetables go into the skillet along with a generous amount of smashed garlic. "But no, you're right...I don't know. My brand of activism--educate, lobby, and protest--just feels particularly impotent in the wake of all that. I want to do more." She sips at her tea gingerly. "Not necessarily with the 'poof', though I do need to get a handle on that." The sauteed vegetables go into a bowl set aside, and she puts a tortilla on the still-hot skillet. "I think what I technically do is facilitate chemical reactions. Like a catalyst. Maybe some kind of /universal/ catalyst. Which..." Her mouth twists to one side. "...sounds like a disaster waiting to happen, honestly." "More like what?" Joshua lifts his brows questioningly. "More -- /potent/? More /poof/? I mean, there's definitely shit out there on the more /fired/-up end of activism, if that's what you're into. I come equipped with some pretty big guns -- I feel pretty lucky /I/ ran into people who knew how to aim them." His fingers unlace from his sweatshirt so that he can pick his tea back up for a sip. "Though that does sound like a fucking nightmare. More boom than poof. Or maybe just horrible acidy death. You practice much?" "More like..." Tian-shin turns the tortilla a few times and spreads a glob of refried beans over it. "...concrete? I've taken some pro bono cases, contesting charges on use of powers. I want to do more stuff like that. Maybe put together some kind of...mentoring or support program? For people who wake up one morning and find they 'poof', or 'boom', or 'bamf', or turn into a great big insect, whatever." She sprinkles some spices and shredded cheese she had combined in a small bowl. "I think I need to know how a reaction works before I can influence it. So right now my repertoire is restricted to high school and college chemistry. More than enough to end in horrible acidy death. Which is why I really need to learn how to...not do that." "Mmm." Joshua gulps at his tea, straightens up, wandering back out of the kitchen. "So you want to play guru to the Gregor Samsas of the world?" His voice comes from a little farther away as he crosses the living room to dig through a cabinet. "I mean, s'people out there doing shit like that." His brows furrow. His head tips back and forth in acknowledgment -- "Not /nearly/ fucking enough of them." He returns to the kitchen with his fist curled closed; when he opens it again it is to deposit a small handful of nails on the counter. "So we learn." "Not playing guru to /anyone/ until I know what the hell I'm doing, but organizations like that need support personnel." Tian-shin shuffles the tortilla around the skillet to keep it from sticking, then starts piling on the rest of the toppings. "And probably legal expertise." She looks at the nails Joshua has brought and arches a thin black eyebrow. "It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize the nails lying around my mother's house were coated to resist corrosion." Her eyes narrow slightly in concentration. "But these are not." A single nail lying at the edge of the pile begins to lose its already dubious luster. By the time she looks away from it to dump the avocados and remaining cheese on the tlayuda, clusters of orange rust have blossomed across the nail. She slides the loaded tortilla onto a plate and sets it down beside Joshua's tea before picking up the nail to inspect it. "Not much to look at, but at least there's no boom." "These are not." Joshua pokes the nail closer to Tian-shin with one finger. He leans down against the counter, propping his cheek against a fist. His eyes focus, not on the nail but on /her/, his other hand dropping down to the countertop as his mind fixes in on her steadily. Not quite telepathy but a more intuitive sense that is all his own, watching her work, /feeling/ her work. He turns his hand over, afterward; in his palm a second nail has grown a near identical bloom of rusting. He looks down at it as if faintly surprised. "No boom. Not yet. Hm." He sets his nail down on the counter, drumming fingertips in a loose cage around it. "What are you doing next week?" Tian-shin blinks in frank puzzlement at the nail beneath Joshua's hand. "But how..." << Teleportation, telepathy, electrokinesis, /and/ this? >> "Oh!" Her eyes widen in sudden comprehension. "You...mimic, learn, or copy powers? That's amazing!" She stares at one corroded nail, then the other. "Ah...right, next week. The same thing I do every week: hunt for jobs. As long as I do it, it doesn't really matter when." "Oh, yeah. I don't actually have shit of my own. I'm basically just a terrible kleptomaniac." Joshua flicks his nail with a finger, sending it rolling over towards Tian-shin's, shedding a fine powder of rust as it goes. "Can't actually teleport or go Sith lord right /now/." He's leaning more heavily against the counter. The rest of the nails in the bunch are starting to rust much faster, his shoulders tightening inward. "Maybe we'll take a couple days. Go out to Oaxaca. Visit your friends. Get some. Serious practice. In." "Klepto or no, you are /so/ much better than I am at this!" Tian-shin nudges one of the rapidly rusting fasteners with the tip of one glossy red fingernail. "Also, if I focus as if I'm trying to do...what you're already doing, I can /feel/ the iron oxide forming." She smiles, faint but unguarded. "I would love to do that. Thank you, but--you know I don't have a whole lot of money right now. I don't want to take advantage of your friendship with my brother." "I don't charge. Not generally." Joshua's eyes are tightening, too, a muscle twitching at his temple. "And like I said, /I/ make. The trip. Home. Pretty much every --" The nail Tian-shin nudges is considerably more crumbly, now, rusted nearly completely /through/. The edge of the counter Joshua is leaning against is -- shakier. Much shakier -- his lean turns into kind of a /stumble/ as the countertop slopes heavily downward, suddenly. One of the drawers underneath it sags outward with a grating noise and a shower of rust, tipping to spill a host of cutlery across the floor. Its runner and the screws that hold it -- /held/ it -- together -- are similarly chewed-up and eaten away, crumbling and rusted. Joshua stands abruptly, pressing a hand to his forehead. "... not," he says, a touch sheepishly, "better than you are. I just sort of. Cheat. But I --" He exhales sharply, suddenly, seeming abruptly /relieved/ as the rapid oxidization /stops/. "... new powers don't really come with an instruction manual, exactly. But I can try and help. Teach you." Even if at the moment he's sort of grimacing at the mess of silverware and rust and sooort of dilapidated counter. Tian-shin bows, but whatever reply she may have made is drowned out in the crash of the falling drawer and the associated cacophony of silverware. She actually hops back minutely, though the cause of the structural failure does not elude her for long. "Are you all right?" Her eyes skip between Joshua and the minor disaster area around them. "An instruction manual sure would be /nice./" But the shock passes momentarily, and she kneels to retrieve the drawer and begin gathering its scattered contents. "I appreciate it, I really do. Hopefully we'll both come out more /selectively/ hazardous to furniture." "Tired," Joshua answers. "It's like manifesting. But in two minutes instead of two years. One day I'll steal the wrong power and accidentally blow up the world." Hopefully he's joking. He crouches down to help pick the silverware back up. "You keep making actual food appear in my house, I'll write you a damn instruction manual. How to be hazardous. At will." "Sounds intense." Tian-shin shakes her head. "It's pretty damned intense even at normal speed." She picks up a piece of the runner that once held up the drawer, corroded down to a skeletal fringe of pitted brown steel. "Holey rusted metal, Batman," she mutters. "Actual food, huh?" Her smile flashes bright and impish, shades of her brother. "You have a deal."