Logs:No Good

No Good
Dramatis Personae DJ, Hive
In Absentia	2021-06-24 "What the hell did you do?" (Set just after Tony drops in on DJ.)
Location <PRV> Rang Phueng Design - Soho
Located on the third floor of a narrow brick-faced office building in SoHo, the lobby of Rang Phueng Design is a comfortable place to wait. There are a number of paintings hung on the walls, brightly colored though somewhat fantastical cityscapes. A large aquarium on one wall, clean and carefully tended, hosts brightly colored marine life swimming through a number of plants and coral. The table amid all the large cheerfully blue-and-silverygrey microsuede couches has a sampling of architectural magazines as well as popular ones, magazines and newspapers generally actually up to date. The receptionist desk is a large black wood one, though it is unmanned. Off to the side a small table has a little refreshment stand set up, a Keurig coffeemachine with a large selection of tea-coffee-cocoa choices and a minifridge beneath the table with juice and water and soda. Through the door in back of the lobby is an enormous workshop space, wide and airy. Spacious drafting tables take up much of the center of the room, a number of glass-topped desks edging the sides though only one of them against the back windows actually boasts a computer. Walls painted white and paneled in glass turn most of the wallspace into whiteboard, generally covered with notes and measurements. The back wall's large windows look out onto the streets, and two side doors lead into a smaller enclosed office spaces. It's grown late for a regular workday, but Hive is still here; looks like he's been here a while, plans to be here a while, judging by the takeout containers on the side table and the bags under his eyes. The sleeves of his black denim shirt are pushed up above his sharp elbows, which are currently propped atop several large sheets of plans, a building dissected and segmented apart -- one expanded view of the same building is hovering nearby him in holographic 3-D, though just at the moment he is eschewing the high-tech in favor of carefully measuring and redrawing with actual ruler and pencil. Hive does get some warning before his work is interrupted -- but it isn't much. The uncanny-valley familiar-alien shape of DJ's mind strobes alarm-bright against the background psionic noise of the city. It's a disorganized manic jumble of grief-heavy memories -- kneeling at an altar, vaguely aware he should be paying attention to the words being said though all he actually has attention for is the way Polaris's hair falls vivid against her white robe Hive, cleaned up nice (for once), his smile crooked as his tie as he cuts in ("-- best man's prerogative--") on DJ with Polaris on the dance floor Tony, hearty congratulations mingled with a touch of incredulity at his glass of sparkling apple cider (-- "knew you were serious but I didn't think it was this serious--") and sick fury, seething and hot as it descends on Hive's office. DJ's fingers have curled into Hive's shirt as soon as he lands, yanking him from his work and whirling the other man around to face him. "What the hell did you do?" Fragments of another exchange float just beneath the question, grit under his fingers and blood in the air, a rasping voice thick with pain, << "Odd psionic surge. Whole damn city, grieving at once." "don't suppose you know anyone who can do that?" >> "Wh --" Hive's pencil clatters from his hand down onto the floor. He slouches back against the table, his shoulders tensed and eyes gone wide. The heavy press of his mind slams down into DJ's, instinctually finding the well-travelled grooves carved out by a touch not-actually-his and pushing hard inside. The clench of his muscles eases in time with the rough shove of his mind, psionic tendrils stretching out to -- -- pull back, just before they've properly taken root. In their wake they leave only their own wash of grief, thick and heavy. "What the fuck?" he finally manages to get out. "Do? Besides -- mourn? Sorry, the fuck exactly did you do when your --" His jaw clamps shut, hard. DJ doesn't resist the intrusion. Leans into it, his grip loosening on Hive's shirt and his breath coming more shakily at the mental touch unfurling within him. He only tenses back up when it pulls back, fist clenching tighter and his head shaking, another flare of anger lancing through him. "Most people don't rip the universe apart when they mourn." There's another ripple of touch against DJ's mind -- softer this time, wrapping against it briefly and then withdrawing. Hive's eyes close, his hands dropping to grip the edge of the drafting table. "Most people would if they fucking could. I'd tear this world inside out and yours too to bring him back if I could." His eyes open again, meeting DJ's steadily. "But I can't. Eat all the people in the world it's not going to -- what, tear a fucking hole in it? I don't know what the hell your Hive could do but I don't know that fucking trick." "It was the same day," DJ bites back. "The same time. That can't just be a coincidence. If you did it you can undo it, you can send me home you can send me back to them. He's lying -- you're lying --" Somewhere here the grief and fury are working themselves back up, Hive's words and Tony's blending in his mind, the keen awareness of Hive's chest against his knuckles no more or less sharp and present than the feel of Tony's throat at his hand. The memories of his wedding day -- getting warped through the portal -- the ruins of the station -- similarly blend into a fragmented whorl, displaced from much sense of time or reality. Hive closes his mouth tight, teeth grinding slow. "I -- I'm sorry." Slowly -- cautiously -- he lifts his arms, curling them close around DJ. "I'd give you your world back, too. If I could. But I swear I --" He just swallows, shakes his head. Squeezes a little tighter. Where Hive's grip tightens DJ's loosens, his fist unclenching as his head drops instead against Hive's chest. The fury has not gone anywhere but it comes out now in racking sobs, tears soaking hot into the other man's rumpled shirt.