ArchivedLogs:Jump In
| Jump In | |
|---|---|
| Dramatis Personae | |
| In Absentia
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2015-09-18 "Are there rules, sweetheart?" |
| 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. Some time late Thursday, texts come to Killian from Dusk's phone:
Friday nights around the Lower East Side safehouse are a lot /busier/ than other times, here. Gone is the quiet trickle of mutants drifting in and out, replaced instead by a noisy crowd occupying the basement with rowdy calls and cheers. The sounds of fighting drift up the stairs, thumps and smacks and grunts of pain. There's a steadier influx of people moving in and out, vetted both by the burly four-armed man at the front door and by the thinner scaley snakelike girl at the bottom of the basement stairs; not everyone who passes muster to be allowed /into/ the safehouse, evidently, is allowed into the fighting ring downstairs. At the moment, with the bulk of activity focused in the basement, the upper levels of the house seem quieter in comparison. A few people chatting at the dining room table, a pair of teenagers (heavily bruised) getting water in the kitchen. In the living room, Regan (dressed for working out in black lycra capris, black and pink sneakers, a black and pink racerback tank, blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail) is curled up in an armchair with a laptop on her lap. It's dark out, there really shouldn't be hawks still flying around. So it's probably not surprising by those well-versed in being around the mutant kind that one circles briefly above. Briefly, because it angles sharply for the sidewalk's concrete barely a couple feet from the steps leading up to the townhouse. The moment it lands, when the sound of talons scratching or perhaps a thud of impact should have been heard, it's the rubber of shoe soles that takes its place. As wings give their final downstroke to break velocity, primaries turn into finger tips and Killian stands from the crouch he'd landed in. Contours of feathers linger like tattooed markings as he steps up to the front door, and dissolve by the time (if?) the four-armed man allows him passage. Haughty, arrogant, there's not much more than a smirk and a tip of his chin for the first of the bouncers. But his hands are wrapped in well-used wrist wraps, his shirt an old grey T- he at least looks the part. Passing the first, the same- though with a wink- would be given to the scaley girl. Regan glances up at the sound outsid the door, giving a small nod to the man at the door when Killian arrives. He's let in without fuss; she glances back down to the screen of her laptop as he passes into the house. "First fight here?" Killian pauses in his path, looking away from the lizardy one to the blonde with the laptop. His grin, crooked though still lightening his expression with mischieviously kind lines at the corners of his eyes, spreads slowly. But there's no real confirmation for the question, one shoulder lazily shrugged with a shake of his head. "A winged- uh- friend," The word sounds awkward from him and he seems amused with it, "told me to come tonight. Not even sure what's on the menu." Attention strays to the basement door, "Y'running matches?" "Generally, whoever chooses to be is on the menu." A small twitch of smile hooks up a corner of Regan's mouth. "Dusk has a startling number of friends." Her eyes are still focused on the laptop screen, though silent and unseen her attention has shifted -- mentally, telepathic senses reaching out to focus on Killian's thoughts. "It's more like a sparring club. There's no -- money in it. Just training." "Training." There's a breath of a chuckle there, a faint thing that sounds to take the place of a roll of his eyes, which instead are narrowed curiously. Probably a touch inappropriately as he watches Regan regardless if her physical-visual focus is on him or not. "Money." Said dismissively. "Are there rules, sweetheart?" His tone is sly, but is mind, well.. From what can be sensed, it's about as mixed as his forms tend to be. The room, the people in it, continually being assessed and reassessed. For exits, for threats, for weapons. It gets that far before there's a mental recoil, though he has no notable training to keep her out. His expression, though his focus remains on her, flickers briefly in something less pleasant. "I am not," Regan answers Killian evenly, "your sweetheart." Her fingers click lightly against her keyboard for a moment, and then she closes the laptop, resting her hand lightly against its lid. "Treat the other participants with respect. I do hope that isn't too much to ask." Killian watches her for a second or two more after that response, his smirk returned but he looks away now to watch one of the bruised contestants climb the final stair and head for the kitchen. A brow raises, curious, "Still workin' on regrowing some skin from the last time I tried that." He replies, but it isn't a no since he punctuates that with, "But I think I can manage." A pause before he adds off-handedly but not without some reasoning, "You gonna jump in?" "I generally do." Regan's eyes shift -- to follow the bruised person emerging from the basement, rather than Killian. "Ion says you two have history." Another silent mental flicker, unfelt mental senses watching Killian's mind thoughtfully. "Dusk and Isra say you want a future. Are you planning to -- jump in?" "Yea," Killian's amusement fades, his expression darkening a few degrees as he gains some hint of seriousness. "Regan, I take it." Is unsurprised, but stated in place of elaborating on his shared history with Ion. Details of thoughts are obscurred, though there's bitternes stoked by her comment, a desire for violence that underscores it. "I do- I would." He corrects unnecessarily, putting his wrapped hands in his pockets, "Ya just let whoever asks 'jump in'?" Tone is lower, not masked by the sarcasm of earlier. "Hardly." Regan shakes her head, just a small twitch of gesture. "The people I do have, though, I trust them quite deeply. When they talk to me, I listen. When they say someone is worth giving a chance --" Her hand turns upward. "The question is, what is it that you want?" "Don't believe I could sell you on trustin' me." Killian says, turning some to walk a few steps and seat himself on the arm of a chair that faces her, pulling his hands from his pockets to lay over his thighs and lean forwards. Thoughtful, "Have a lot 'a reason to be angry- a lot of us do." He briefly spreads his hands in an encompassing motion, "Spent all my time with these powers in a cage or runnin' from it. I'd like to be.. useful." The real word 'revenge' is not hidden in the forefront of his thoughts. "Y'got Ion." He says after a few moments, a twitch of an eye given to a thought which, if accessed, seems to be a feeling of belonging or a desire of it. "If y'can put up with him, sure you could with me too." The latter seems colder, withdrawn in the attempt to be honest. "Tonight?" There's a curl of amusement threaded through Regan's quiet contralto. "Unlikely. Trust generally takes time to build. But /given/ time -- I suppose that depends on you." She sets her closed laptop aside, folding neatly manicured fingers together in her lap. "I meet a lot of angry people. Some of them stay in places like this a while and then move on. Some are looking for some stability while they move past that anger. Some --" A small upward lift of one shoulder. "Want to be useful." One hand lifts, curls up against her lips to hide a chuckle at the mention of Ion. "But whatever people are looking for, I like to think we do a little more than simply put up with each other through it." Killian watches her, a little too still. A brow raised again at her note on trust, there's the slighest edge of a grin that lingers, but it's a dark one. "There's a lot more to it than that-" A fraction of a nod agrees with the final portion of it that she offers, but he doesn't continue with his opinion. Instead, "I don't have intention to move past anything." He says, with a deliberate inflection of 'anything'. "Just fine as I am." The cockiness is interrupted by the implication of a 'but' in his pause. "I could do a lot for you, the Brotherhood. My..." His laugh is just a breath, almost a cough, "tools are yours. But I want a place to be. And a group that would make a difference for 'stead of random hits and shit." He stops there, looking at his wraps to pick at the frayed edges. "And I have little intention of changing you." Regan unfolds from her chair, getting up with a slow stretch up onto the balls of her sneakers. "But those other things -- we can offer." She glances to the wraps on Killian's hand, her smile now a little easier. "C'mon. Why don't you come downstairs and see what Friday nights are like?" Killian stands some time after she does, his movements not all unlike his feline forms could be. Quiet, intentional. He slips from his spot on the chair's arm, uncoiling slowly to his height. Maybe it's the change in subject or maybe it's just easier for him to draw the smirk back into place, an arm extended towards the basement doorway and the one who 'guards' it. "After you." | |
