ArchivedLogs:Pretty Crime

Pretty Crime
Dramatis Personae Dusk, Jackson, Tag
In Absentia	2013-06-20 '
Location <NYC> Village Lofts - Rooftop - East Village
It tends to be windy, up here, but the presence of plastic table and folding chairs suggests that nevertheless building residents occasionally make their way out to this rooftop. With a good view of Tompkins Square Park less than a block away it's a good spot for city-watching. There's a railing around the edge, though it might be possible (if /unwise/) to climb over it to the narrow concrete ledges beyond and from there to the fire escape. Centrally, someone has broken down crates and constructed a small raised-bed garden up here, barren in winter but filled in three other seasons with a small assortment of herbs and vegetables. In comparison to the rest of the week in the city, today is quiet, an oddly tense but nevertheless less /violent/ spell that followed the revelation of NYPD violence at Stark's conference. Despite the quiet it's still not exactly /pleasant/ for the most obvious of mutants out on the streets -- but then, when is it? Up on the Lofts roof, though, there is a far reduced chance for random acts of bigotry. Still not entirely eliminated, there's a couple on two who definitely /disapprove/ of the heavy mutant population of their building and one woman on seven who is prone to a lot of muttering and glares, but they tend to avoid the common spaces as much as possible. So now here is a Dusk, dressed in dark cargo shorts, barefoot, no shirt to let his wings move freely. One of them, anyway; the other is still splinted along one long fingerbone, still wrapped with tape to bind it folded shut and prevent much movement. The /other/ wing, though, is stretching, to its full impressive span, far longer than Dusk is tall. He is tucked up against the side of the roof, a thermos in his hands, watching the city below. His laptop is up here with him, on the plastic table nearby, currently open to a terminal and a notepad with many lines of code. He is ignoring this. Work. Pfft. Jax is a little more dressed than Dusk when he emerges onto the roof. Admittedly only a little, in black shorts edged with reflective silver, a thin ribbed purple tank top. He also has food -- or, well, OK, he has cookies, it's almost /like/ food; he sets the tupperware down alongside Dusk's computer, though he keeps the thermos /he/ has in hand as he joins Dusk at the wall. Doesn't say anything, just climbs up to lie down along the top of the concrete barrier, one leg dangling down along the outside of the wall and one on its inside. He rests the thermos against his chest, eye focused up directly at the sun in the way people are often told not to do. The rapid, rhymic clang of feet on metal stairs presages Tag's arrival. He flips over the railing and leans against it, face flushed and breathing hard. He looks oddly bland in a royal blue t-shirt and khaki cargo pants, especially because he has tucked his mop of--black?!--hair under an AC/DC ball cap. This lasts all of thirty seconds; he yanks the cap off as if he has just remembered that he does not want to wear it anymore. By the time his hair falls across his eyes, it has turned Leeloo orange. He rises and waves at Dusk and Jax with the cap as he pads over, palette-swapping himself as he goes. The shirt settles into a kind of sky blue, with wispy mauve clouds, and the shorts forest green on its way to black. "Hi," he says. "I um...I was in the neighborhood." He looks vaguely embarrassed, for some reason. "Heyyyy." Dusk says this to Tag, not Jax. Jax does get a greeting, of sorts, his wing outstretched to brush one fuzzy edge against Jax's dangling leg. "You missed Game Night," he says this sort of regretful rather than like an accusation. "We played Gloom. Jax made it cheerful." /This/, at least, /does/ sound like an accusation. "Don't think I've seen you that bland ever. People been giving you shit lately?" "Tag!" Jackson's eyes light; he sits up with a sudden bright smile on his face. /His/ hair is not vivid colours today but only by dint of the fact he /has/ none, head shaved down to the skin to reveal a large (colourful!) tattoo of a chimera-esque creature. He rolls down off the wall with a brush of fingertips against Dusk's wing, hurrying towards Tag to offer a hug. "Hi! Ohmygosh hi I'm glad you /were/ how have you been everything's been /crazy/." "Sorry, I kind of...lost track of /days,/" Tag replies, stressing the last word as if he did not quite grok it and wanted to do more research before drawing any conclusions. "No one has really bothered me, though. I think they have maybe found easier targets. Like I guess people with wings, or blue skin." He hugs Jax, leaning into him more heavily than usual. "I er...I have been looking for work. Finding some, here and there." A noncommittal shrug, eyes straying to cookies, irises bleeding from brown to magenta. "But mostly just crimes." He blinks rapidly. "I could have blue skin. Haven't done that in a while." "Yeah," Dusk turns, resting just one elbow against the rooftop now so that he can better face Tag. "That happens. Days have been kind of." His eyes lower, and for a moment he lapses into quiet, wings slightly drooping behind him. "Don't know if you want blue skin. Shane got shot just this past week." He uncaps his thermos, taking a tentative sip. His wing flexes just slightly in its binding. "-- Crimes?" Jackson squeezes Tag tight -- a little bit tighter for the leaning, chin dropping for a moment to rest on Tag's head before he releases him. "Yeah, it ain't really been the week for blue skin. Seems a spell quieter now than it was earlier but still -- probably. Not. Ideal. Mmm. /'Specially/ not ideal while you're commitin' crimes. Y'want cookies? They're like. Espresso an' chocolate an' oatmeal." Tag's wandering eyes snap to Dusk momentarily. "/Shot/?! Is he okay? I mean, as being shot goes? Does someone need to--" He stops abruptly, fidgets with the ball cap. "I don't think I would get shot," he says, kind of meditatively, as if he were commenting on something serene and not deadly violence. "But yeah, blue skin might impede crimes--you know, pretty much everything I like to do is some kind of crime. So I stopped worrying about it, and I would love some cookies." Picking up a random cookie, Tag imprints it with a bright red Rebel Alliance symbol before biting into it. "He heals fast," Dusk says, "you don't. So I'd recommend whatever route of criminal activity /doesn't/ get you shot." His weight settles further against the wall, dark eyes lifting to Tag before turning back outwards towards the city. "There's been enough of that already." Jackson drifts back over to the wall, hoisting himself back up to sit atop it. Upright, this time, though he still straddles the wall, one heel kicking restlessly against it. "You should come," he tells Tag. "To Game Night. Next time." His brow creases, slightly. "Matt seemed -- less well." His hand scuffs across the top of his head, and then drops to rest on the wall behind him. "Has your crime been /pretty/ crime? I've been," he says with a tone of regret, "really short on crime myself lately." Tag stares at his cookie. "I am taking precautions to not get shot. Like the um...disguises." He flaps the AC/DC cap against his thigh. "I don't think it's a game. Well, maybe a little bit. A serious and deadly game, except I didn't read the rules, so I'm just drawing all over the board." He slides over and sits down with his back against the wall. "I'll try to make it next Tuesday. And not draw on the actual boards. Even though they might be prettier if I did. Like the walls and stuff. I always try to make pretty crime." Craning his head back to address Jax, he adds, "You do stuff that's way more important than /vandalism/." "Don't think there are any rules." Dusk sinks down to rest his cheek against one forearm; with his current state of extreme pallor, the slumped posture looks just /exhausted/. "Or at least if there are, /everyone's/ breaking them. You could recolour our Discworld board, I think it's probably thematic for it to be a little bit fucked-up /anyway/." His eyes close, wings twitching. The good one extends, brushing lightly against Tag's elbow. "Right now? I'd say spreading a little cheer is pretty important." "I try to do important things," Jackson answers with a slight wrinkle of his nose, "but I think Dusk's right, every inch'a cheer right now helps." He uncaps his own thermos, taking a sip then offering it to Tag. "Tea?" His heel thuds against the wall again. His head turns, gaze slipping past Dusk to look down to Tag. "How you been /'sides/ the crime?" "I don't know how much cheer I'm spreading with my art, honestly," Tag mutters, propping his chin on one heavily scuffed knee. "It's /colorful/ and all, but not very...cheerful. Now." Still, there is a shadow of childlike joy in his bright pink eyes when he reaches out to run a hand over Dusk's wing the way he might idly pet a passing cat. "I /try/ sometimes, it just doesn't come out quite...right. Kind of like playing with toys changed when I was twelve, and were never the same again. Until I discovered hallucinogens." He accepts the thermos from Jax and sips from it, smiling wanly. "There isn't a whole lot in my life besides crime, but mostly all right, I guess? Checking in with Mel so she doesn't completely lose it, running some errands and doing some commissions, eating or sleeping every once in a while." That resigned shrug again as he passes the thermos back up. "Surviving. How about you two, other than...horribleness, and serious business?" Dusk relaxes, just slightly, under the petting; his wing stays, brushed up against Tag's arm. "Yeah --" His voice is soft, a little wistful. "It's been a hard time for cheer. Maybe," he says wryly, "I should try hallucinogens. I've mostly been sober and I'm not sure why. -- Eating and sleeping is good." His lips press together. "/Other/ than horribleness?" This earns a quiet chuff, and nothing else. "/Yeah/," Jackson stretches out a leg to /nudge/ Dusk with a toe, "eating /is/ good, you should /try/ it sometime. -- Woah. Playing with toys changed?" His eye widens. "Why?" His smile curls, warm but a little strained. "Survivin'," he says, quiet. "A little bit'a work, a little bit'a art. A lot'a survivin'. Still find time for cheer, though. S'kinda vital. Almost as much so as eating." Tag folds his arms over his knees and rests his head on them, pressing against Dusk's wing--again the way some cats do. "If you are ever looking for hallucinogens, I know a shaman who grows and brews his own stuff. Although..." He makes a face, sticking out his tongue slightly. "...most of it tastes kind of awful." Then, to Jax, with a crooked smile, "I dunno, defective puberty, I guess? It probably didn't help that my father took my toys away and said I needed to focus on my studies. I think I subconsciously rebelled by not actually growing up." "Shaman?" Dusk doesn't open his eyes, but his eyebrows raise. "Sounds kind of hippie." He /does/ crack an eye open at Jax's nudging, shoulders slumping still further. "You should get high /first/," he says, "then I'd kill two birds with one stone." His eye closes again. "They don't tell you in health class that losing your sense of fun is part of puberty." "Don't think that comes standard," Jax answers. He looks back downward at Tag, but then closes his eyes, flopping back along the wall to just lie boneless-lazy. "I don't think you gotta grow up to --" His lips quirk upwards. "Grow up. -- I am /not/ takin' drugs to get you high, dude. Y'want it you can have the bad taste yourself." "He's more...punk than hippie," Tag muses, "maybe a bit of both. Man, I bet getting your blood sucked while you're tripping would be /awesome./ But I can get a bit crazy with the colors when I'm high. Not like I can't fix it later, and I usually don't do living tissue accidentally." He pauses, bites his lip. "/Usually./ They didn't tell me much of anything in health class. My parents had me opt out of the parts where they told you about sex. So I pretty much got ‘Drugs are bad, mmmkay?'" Tag tilts his head back and squints at the sky, smiling. "New life goal: never grow up. Ever." "Does it hurt, if you do?" Dusk's wing prods thoughtfully against Tag's side. "-- Could you make my wings --" He stops, thoughtful, slow to settle on a colour: "Red?" Tag's life goal ears a small chuff; it might be laughter from the tone but there's no humour in his pallid expression. "The world makes that one hard." "Red. C'mon that's so stereotypical, make it -- lime green." Jackson takes another small sip of his tea, then rests the thermos against his chest. "S'worse goals in life. -- Oh, /gosh/, Tag, did I tell you /I/ got sex ed classes at school foisted off on me? I gotta teach a bunch'a teenagers about -- it seems like a huge responsibility. An' I'm probably /supposed/ to say drugs are bad but that seems like kinda a really naive approach to it. -- Gettin' your blood sucked, tripping or not, s'kinda alright." "Nope, it doesn't hurt--that's Jax's territory." Tag idly paints a smiley face on his left forearm. "In fact, it doesn't even feel like /anything,/ except this one girl said it tickled, but she was pretty stoned. So was I. It took a lot of concentrating. Looked pretty cool, though it comes off with the skin, bit by bit. Haven't figured out how to get it underneath yet. Again, that's Jax's territory." He rolls onto his knees and studies the membrane of Dusk's wing, cocking his head first to one side, then the other. "Shouldn't be any trouble. Red is usually easier to get right, on most human skin tones. Probably green would be easier if you were a Vulcan or a cabbage or something." Glancing back over his shoulder at Jax, Tag grins. "Good luck! That is awesome, I think you would be the coolest sex ed teacher ever. Your students will probably try to make some kind of competition out of asking you something that would stump you, or make you blush, or piss you off. Drugs...you can say they're bad, but a lot of kids are going to do ‘em anyway, so you might as well tell them how to not die while they're at it, right? Not sure if that's how it works in formal education, but I kind of get the impression your school plays things fast and loose." He looks up again, as if just remembering something. Red creeps into the orange of his hair from the roots up. "I think I slept with a vampire once. No blood sucking, though. I guess he wasn't /that/ kind of vampire?" "My skin tone isn't exactly human," Dusk answers with a small crook of smile, flexing one fuzzy dark wing towards Tag. "So it'll -- wash /out/?" He looks curiously over at Tag's colour-changing hair. One eyebrow quirks upward. "What kind of vampire /was/ he? I think he was failing at maybe an essential component there." His gaze has shifted, now, from Tag's hair to his forearm. Then to the inside of that wrist. "Who're you to judge?" Jackson teases Dusk lightly. "You the arbiter now of what makes a good vampire? Gonna go around deciding someone else just ain't vampire /enough/?" He sits up, swinging both legs to the inside of the wall. He takes one more sip of tea, then offers the thermos back to Tag. "I tell Shane not to do drugs outside'a home, that's seemed t'be an alright compromise. He's /around/ where we can keep an eye on him. -- D'you think you'd be /able/ to get it under the skin if you --" He studies his own arms thoughtfully. "Can you work with colour that's already there at all, or do you just layer over it?" Tag wrinkles his brows thoughtfully. "In the sense that skin comes off a little every time you wash? Yeah. So this," he indicates the demonstration smiley on his arm, "will kind of fade out over about a week. Faster, if I scrub really hard! But that's only ablation. Nothing--other than me--can actually remove the color from what I put it on, as far as I can tell, so stuff like hair is permanent. Until you bleach or something." He shrugs again, sits back on his heels. "I didn't ask him, since I was pretty wired and he was...well, a pretty hot vampire, whatever kind he was." Accepting the tea from Jax, he swishes it around inside the thermos. "Nah, I can't work with other pigment; I only make and change...whatever weird spectrum-bendy thing I make and change. Don't have to layer it opaque though! I usually put transparent color on skin and hair and stuff. Looks too harsh otherwise, though that can be a cool effect, too." He sips the tea and hands it back. "Now I /really/ want to paint something!" "Oh --" Dusk's brows furrow, and he folds his wing back in cloaklike against his back. "I'm pretty fuzzy. I'd probably stay green /forever/. -- How do you /know/ he was a vampire?" His fangs bare towards Jax. "Look, there's /some/ things that are just in the job description, alright? I'm not a chef if I don't cook things. I'm not a writer without setting down words." "You could paint this wall. We could do with more cheer up here. -- I think you're just infringing on other people's right to self-identify. I mean, is vampire a /job/? Who's paying you? I think it's more like being gay. Or a man. Like, if he feels like a vampire who's to say he's not a vampire? Are you going to reach down his -- uh." Jax squints at Dusk's pants for a moment, then looks back up, "-- well, check in his mouth, I guess, and /see/? Measure his teeth?" Dusk bares his (long!) fangs at Jax, but there's distinct amusement in his expression, a soft laugh huffed out through his nose. "He had pointy teeth--not quite like yours!--but I didn't ask for his ID or anything," Tag admits with a little curve of a bemused smile. "Do vampires have a /union/? Or a guild! Kind of seems that way at some goth clubs." He rises and takes a step back to scrutinize the wall. "Area fill is easy. Cheer, though..." Nevertheless, the surface of the concrete where he was just sitting a moment ago changes, brightens into a tawny gold color, then becomes the peak of a dune that slopes down until it rises into another, across the entire length of the wall. The blue of a clear summer sky lags a few seconds behind and fills in the rest of the space. Grasses, shells, and driftwood sprout from the sand; shore birds pick their way across the dunes and sky. These smaller details clearly become more taxing the farther away they get. If the speed with which he has produced this mural isn't a hint that Tag is showing off, his decision to stay in one spot certainly is. "I know a /few/ people with pointy teeth. They're not all vampires! But --" Dusk frowns, uncertain: "/I/ wouldn't call myself a vampire /either/. Everyone /else/ would, though. If there's a union I haven't paid my dues, uh, ever." He quiets as the mural spreads, taking a step back himself to watch it grow. His eyes widen in appreciation and he tugs Jax down off the wall. "Dude, that's awesome." When his fangs bare again it is in a quick smile. "I mean, shit. Awesome. Can you do the rest --?" His wing gestures out to the other walls on the roof! Drab and unpainted. "Can I /bribe/ you to do the rest with more cookies?" "Those are my cookies," Jackson objects, but he objects with a laugh. He slides down off the wall, tucking himself in against Dusk to watch the mural grow from the shelter of one wing. "No, really, though, that's kind of awesome. -- You don't have to make it all cheerful if you ain't feeling cheerful. /Colourful/ is pretty great all on its own." He tips his head up to look at Dusk, amused. "You could /start/ your own guild! Not for vampires if y'don't want to be one. For." He considers this. "Hematophages. Or. For Batmen." Tag grins, puffing up just a little--and then going onto his tip-toes. "Like you have to bribe me! I climb tall buildings and defy guys with guns to do this." He finds a spot more or less at the center of the rooftop spins around slowly, studying his canvas. Then he returns to the beach wall and starts adding more grass to one end of it, continuing onto the blank wall adjoining it, which becomes a meadow dizzy with wildflowers, butterflies, and soaring tufts of thistledown. The field grows hilly as it approaches the next corner and transitions to a vista of mountains beyond mountains, the distant ones blue with fog and capped with snow. By the time the mountains subside into piedmont and eventually a verdant forest on the fourth wall, Tag is biting his lip and furrowing his brows in fierce concentration. The depths of the shady woodland conceal dozens of animals and even a winding brook that finds its way to the corner and disappears behind some dunes to reappear as it empties into the distant sea. "You know," Tag mutters as if speaking to himself, "a cookie /does/ sound pretty nice right about now." Yet he is turning again to inspect his work with fever-bright eyes. "Could use more wildlife, though...maybe some dragonflies." Dragonflies appear in the air above the meadow as if conjured forth by the word, but the conjurer looks like he is about to fall over. Dusk grins as the dragonflies appear. He turns in a circle, too, examining the murals now gracing all the walls. "Holy shit," he sounds kind of awed, "dude, that's fucking --" His brows crease as he looks back to Tag. "-- exhausting, /uh/, man, how about we get you inside. Sit down. Get some food into you." Jax's expression lights -- first at the images but more notably at the /dragonflies/ that are the finishing touch. "Oh, wow --" is soft, but then his arm snakes out around Tag -- less a hug and more /support/ as he looks at Tag's expression. "... oh, wow," this sounds less awed and more just concerned. "Uh, yeah, um! Let's. Get you. Some rest. And cookies. And -- sitting down." "I'm okay!" Tag insists, like a child who doesn't want to take a nap. "I just need a minute. And maybe cookies. Then, maybe I can add some dolphins, or a kingfisher, or deer..." He does not turn down Jax's assistance in dragging himself to the nearest chair. "It's gotta be a distance thing. That's the only thing I've been doing different lately--lots of /ranged/ art." The cookie he picks up blazes solid green for a moment, but the edges fade back into a cookie-like shade of brown, leaving the Green Lantern symbol in the center. "Sorry, I didn't mean to make you worry." Tag chuckles self-consciously. "I should have just, you know, walked around the roof and done it from up close. But it makes me feel like a /wizard/ to just kinda stand back and throw color at stuff. With my brain. Although..." He frowns, takes a big bite out of the cookie, chews pensively, swallows. "Why would it make me tired if I was just using my brain? Maybe it's, like...sucking ATP from my cells or something." He gasps, almost jumps out of the chair. "Whoa Dusk do you get people's powers when you drink their blood? That would be the best!" "Thinking too much burns calories," Dusk points out with a small quick smile. "I bet wizarding does, too." He picks up the whole box of cookies, closing his laptop as well. "C'mon. We're going. Get you some /real/ food. -- Uh." He stops, head shaking, but then continues on his way to the door to hold it open. "No. I don't -- get their powers when I drink their blood. I get --" He shrugs, and then says wryly: "Less hungry." Jackson shrugs, glancing away to the murals again. "It's suckin' something," he says, "what I do burns glucose like crazy. Think the /whys/ are another question entirely, uh, mostly comes down to mutants are weird as heck." He nudges Tag, offering the other man his arm for support purposes. "People kinda get his powers," he says with a crooked smile, "or well ‘least we share the rush." If Tag meant to utter some kind of coherent agreement to Dusk's suggestion, his words are garbled by stuffing three-quarters of a cookie into his mouth at once. He hooks his arm through Jax's and levers himself up, chewing furiously. "Wait, wait...oh, you don't mean that we get to fly? Because you know in some legends it's /contagious/. Being a vampire, I mean. Not wings, usually." As they pass the forest wall, he surreptitiously adds a green kingfisher to a branch that stretches out over the stream. "I used to be pretty obsessed with the /whys/. Now I just want food! What are we eating?" "It's not /exactly/ contagious, no. Not the bloodsucking ot the wings. Uh --" Dusk looks at Jax expectantly as he holds the door open. "What /are/ we eating?" "Somethin' tasty," Jax answers bright and entirely unhelpful. He takes one last look at the wall murals before he navigates them inside. "Do I ever let you down?"