Logs:Ocean's Three?

Ocean's Three?
Dramatis Personae DJ, Hive, Skye	2021-03-17 "How do you do with witty banter under pressure?"
Location <NYC> Evolve Cafe - Lower East Side
Spacious and open, this coffeeshop has a somewhat industrial feel to it, grey resin floors below and exposed-beam ceilings that have been painted up in a dancing swirl of abstract whorls and starbursts, a riot of colour splashed against a white background. The walls alternate between brick and cheerfully lime-green painted wood that extends to the paneling beneath the brushed-steel countertops. There's an abundance of light, though rather than windows (which are scarce) it comes from plentiful hanging steel lamps. The walls here are home to artwork available for sale; though the roster of prints and paintings and drawings and photographs changes on a regular basis it has one thing in common -- all the artists displayed are mutants. The seating spaced around the room is spread out enough to keep the room from feeling cluttered. Black chairs, square black tables that mostly seat two or four though they're frequently pushed around and rearranged to make space for larger parties. In the back corner of the room is more comfortable seating, a few large black-corduroy sofas and armchairs with wide tables between them. There's a shelf of card and board games back here available for customers to sit and play. The chalkboard menus hanging behind the counter change frequently, always home to a wide variety of drinks (with an impressive roster of fair-trade coffees and teas largely featured) though their sandwiches and wraps and soups and snacks of the day change often. An often-changing variety of baked goods sit behind the display case at the counter halfway back in the room, and the opposite side of the counter holds a small selection of homemade ice creams. A pair of single-user bathrooms flanks the stairway in back of the cafe; at night, the thump of music can be heard from above, coming from the adjoining nightclub of the same name that sits up the stairs above the coffeehouse. Winter is still hanging in there, though the wind has lost some of its bite even after dark. The usual weekday evening crowd has gotten a slight boost with the small cluster of people recently decanted from the vigil in Chinatown, peacefully dispersed -- despite many angry calls for a march -- with a wary eye toward the extra NYPD presence there and in the neighborhood generally. At the tail end of this straggling group, Skye enters and just heads to a corner table, her usually robust appetite failing her today. She's wearing a bright red coat over a black dress whose opaque portions only covers her from armpits to mid-thigh, though a fine floral lace in the same color lends it a bit more modesty, extending up to a mandarin collar and down to her elbows and knees, her sheer stockings and black maryjanes tasteful if unremarkable. Her hair is meticulously braided, not her usual style, and her makeup is plain, heavy in smoky black, save for scarlet lips stark against still winter-pale skin. She fishes her phone out of her lacy purse, but then just lays it face-down on the table. Is tempted to lay her head face-down on the table, too, though she does not. << Really should eat something. He should eat something, anyway, dude's too damn skinny...oh shit I am turning into my mother. Will she ever leave her apartment again? >> "Well," she says. "Fuck." Hive tumbles himself into a seat opposite Skye, peeling himself out of his jacket and draping it over the back of his chair. His grey sweater underneath hangs loose on his bony frame, his hair poking out long from underneath his knit Theta Tau beanie. He does lie down, arms folding and his head dropping down against them. "Hngh," he answers in a quiet grunt. "Why would anyone leave the apartment? Shit. I was just thinking about suggesting we stay in for the next decade." Outside there's a sharp mental fluttering, alien and familiar all at once in its rapid darting even before DJ arrives. Flitting between an anxious fretting about propriety, a deep underlying heartache, an uncomfortably out-of-place dissociation, a careful mental cataloguing of the street around him, the exits, the people passing by, the -- -- opening door, which lets in DJ, dressed in lined flannel under a canvas chore jacket, jeans, boots, a large box wrapped in green paper with a silver bow under his arm. His eyes flicker around the cafe in a rapid assessing sweep; his mind registers a ping of disappointment in almost the same moment that it hitches and hitches again over another wrenching shudder of grief. << -- oh -- >> tumbles headlong into, << (wrong one) >>; an reminder to himself that he repeats more emphatically again a moment later. << wrong one >> -- Though even after his thoughts keep spinning: << is it weird to go talk to him? is it weird not to go talk to him? This is definitely weird either way shut up shut up -- >> His head bows, hand curling just a little tighter as he resumes heading toward the counter to place his order. "She barely left it before the panorama," Skye groans, still stubbornly resisting the urge to join her roommate's collapse onto the table, held back as much by a powerful need to look like she's together and a distant buzz of anxiety about not having eyes on their surroundings. << Just stop that Hive would notice. >> "But you got a point. I'm down. Let's never go outside. My whoring days are --" A swell of rage and grief and cold dread steals her words for an instant. "-- over." She's saved from having to process all that just yet by DJ's arrival. Her eyes snap up to him and stare unblinking until she forces herself to look away. << Jesus H. tapdancing Christ, that's never gonna not be weird... >> And then a sudden twinge of sorrow for Hive, then protectiveness, then faint abashment. << He's a grown man, and probably more together than I am [ though who knows, overhearing all that...] } "What is out here that we can't get delivered? We've got a coffee machine. We've got a cat." Hive's shoulder's tense, hard, at the cold flush of rage that goes through Skye. "We would make good shut-ins if you don't care too much about..." He cuts himself off, just a moment before the door opens, head dragging up and his eyes wider. His shoulders are still hunched; a rough jagged claw of psionic limbs coil themselves around DJ's mind in reflexive grasp, starting to sink in and just as soon pulling back. His head sinks down into his hands, fingers clenching into his hair. << Yo. >> It's a heavy sledgehammer of a voice thumping down into the other man's mind. "... fucking beard," he mutters, aloud, half down to the table. DJ's mind presses automatically back into the touch, old and well worn pathways in his mind already molded into an easy groove for the psionic claws to fit themselves into. He shies back away in an inward shudder in the space of the next thought, though, that knot of grief clenching harder. He fixates intently on his exchange with the barista, handing over his wrapped box as well as cash, starting to order his cocoa but then hesitating with a thought to Hive and Skye's empty table. << ... do you all need food? Drinks? Anything? >> "I'd worry about mom, I guess..." Skye says reluctantly. << ...even if no one can actually hurt her. >> "But she'd go out of her mind sleeping on the couch and I am not sharing a room with her." << Oh, man...I'm sorry. >> She reaches across the table and lays one hand gently on Hive's elbow. "Fucking everything, huh?" << I don't know about that much beard but -- wait didn't he have two arms last time I saw him? And it's the wrong fucking arm what the fuck -- >> "Obviously I just need to get richer. Buy the rest of the building. Or -- build my own. Fucking. Shut in... commune." Hive's fingers are scrunching harder, his eyes steadily fixed downward. There's an uncomfortable squeeze of mental pressure that responds to Skye's touch, his mind butting heavily up against hers. "... do you want food?" He recalculates a moment later: "You'll eat some soup? Been a long fucking. Night. Days. Time." His teeth are grinding, and though he doesn't look up an assent -- some oolong, two of whatever the soup of the day is -- thuds back into DJ's mind. "... he had two arms." His frown is growing. "You think there's a world somewhere out there where people are just. Doing. Okay?" The chaos of DJ's mind is falling into a quieter rhythm, some of his wayward strands of thought tucked away into their own neater weave -- still there, but a more unobtrusive background tapestry, now. << Soup. Got it. >> He's trying not to mull too long over the tortilla soup on offer today, trying not to raise an automatic objection ( << will you even like that one? >> ) Trying to remind himself he has no idea what this Hive likes. It's a reminder he's still giving himself when he brings the pot of tea and empty mugs carefully balanced on a tray over to their table. "Soup's coming. Sorry, it was -- Skye, right? I was a little out of sorts last time we met." "I could probably get rich if I really wanted to put my ass out there," Skye says, straining to sound light. "Not -- my literal ass, which is nice but not that nice. More like 'one last job', you know?" Her hand presses harder, even through the wave of mental discomfort. << You can uh...assimilate me? If you need to. Won't -- can't -- pretend I'm not intimidated (can hear my thoughts anyway) but after this whole day just... >> She drops her own gaze to the tabletop. << If you need to. >> Her mind buzzes, a mess of uncertainty and concern and still the background of grief and rage. << Yeah -- soup, thanks (is that ever gonna not be weird?). Don't actually want it but. Gotta eat. (Could do with some passing out tee bee aech.) >> The mention of tea stills her near-frantic thoughts, though, and she seizes on it to re-center herself, old meditation habits kicking in. By the time DJ arrives she's more or less calm, and even looks up to offer him a faint smile. "Yeah, Skye -- not sure if I'm more impressed you remembered or that you were only a little out of sorts. Um, should we call you..." << ...Dawson? Flicker? Mister Allred? >> "What should we call you?" "It's a perfectly nice --" Hive's brows knit, his eyes flicking very quickly up toward Skye before settling back on the table. "One last job. What would you steal." << You want to pass out I'll get you home but. Might be better to wait. >> His teeth grind again, harder, his eyes closing. There's a return of that mental pressure, sinking in around Skye's mind -- -- but pulling back with a twitch, a ragged startled hitch of breath; Hive looks up sharp with DJ's arrival. "-- Dawson," comes out just a bit unsteady, his hands dropping to the table as he slumps back in his chair. "You want to join our heist team? Not sure about your style, but how do you do with witty banter under pressure?" DJ sets the tray down, setting one of the teacups in front of Skye. "It's DJ." His fingers tighten around the other as he reaches for it; there's a ripple of anger that darts reflexive through his mind. << (not fair) >> << can't just jump into -- you're not HIM I'm not him we're not friends -- >> (Somewhere under that, with the muddled haze of memory, the sound of Styx -- Hangman is coming down from the gallows and I don't have very long -- playing over a dry ghost of another Hive's voice in his mind: This is why we hate escort missions.) The hitch in his movement has lasted only an instant; the cup vanishes from his hand, settles quiet and precise into place in front of Hive. The anger hasn't faded -- just slotted itself into some old and familiar notches in his mind. Comfortable, settled. "I think Skye's the only one at this table with style right at the moment." He drops down into an empty chair. "I have a little practice. What are we stealing?" "I was << (mostly?) >> joking." << He knows that. >> Skye straightens up reflexively when DJ sets the cup down, the dip of her head and the demure "thank you" equally reflexive, lapsing out of sheer exhaustion into customer service mode for just a moment before snapping out of it again with a faint blush. "Sorry," she blurts, also reflexively, the cringe after it wholly internal. << Fuck am I going to be like this with white guys forever -- even him (he's not Flicker) -- >> "DJ?" she asks, suddenly imagining -- not DJ, actually, but Flicker -- at a turntable above a crowded rave, the joins in his prosthetic arm lit from within by blue LEDs that pulse in time to the thump of house music. The surreal humor this brings doesn't really cancel out the flutter of sorrow that it also brings. "Uh..." she says, scrambling to collect her thoughts. "I hadn't really thought that through, but maybe..." Her eyes light up. << Cue Leverage music. >> "Let's steal an apartment complex."