Logs:The Wrath of Grapes

The Wrath of Grapes
Dramatis Personae Blink, Jade
In Absentia	2024-11-17 "I hope yer on my side, Hun."
Location <NYC> La Galleria Mall - Midtown
It was quite a gloomy day outside in New York today. Clouds covered up the radiance of the sun, and the underbelly grew somewhat dark. It was good, especially for one single redhead. She was inside the La Galleria Mall, a sprawling 4 story mall, equipped with two food courts and shops as far as the human eye could see, save for the mutant one. This was where Jade Sorcha, a novice mutant could practice escapism from her seemingly neverending overthinking and whatnot. It was also where she could get most of her clothes and books. The redhead was planning on spending quite a few hours here as there was nothing to do back at her abode, her work was finished for the day, and this was a marvelous chance for her to get her mind off of everything. "Finally, ah never thought ah'd get ta come back hea." Jade said to herself, smiling as she pushed the glass doors to the building open, getting out of the peoples way to look around for what she would attempt first. Dressed in black joggers with red bats, platform black boots, an oversized sweatshirt with some sort of cybercigilism, spelling out revenge. Her regular piercings were the norm, she almost never took them out except to wash them. The goth woman sat down at the food court as she went on her phone, looking at her list for what to get. Jade got distracted and ended up getting something to eat from a Perry's barbecue inside the mall, thankfully it was close to where she sat. Blink wanders into the food court, squinting down at her phone and then up at the surrounding kiosks before queuing up at a Jamba Juice stand. She's wearing a black hoodie with "Save Our Seas!" on the back among rainbow colored line art of various marine animals, unzipped over a purple sweetheart blouse, wide wide-leg jeans, and black sneakers. With the hood up it's easy to mistake her for any other shopper, but when she gets up to the counter she pushes the hood back to expose her magenta-streaked black hair (not that unusual), her long pointed ears (okay, a little weird), and eyes with green sclera and no white visible at all (pretty creepy). "Hi." She flashes a bright smile at the teenager behind the register, who is staring at her in mild surprise. "Can I get uh...Pina Colada, please?" She pays and waits off to the side for the other teenager in the kiosk to make her smoothie. Said teenager seems to be having some trouble with that, and keeps darting not very furtive glances at Blink as she works. Or tries to work. She's in the middle of loading up the blender when there's a loud thwack against the inside of the plastic display case showing off the whole fresh fruits that are probably not going into your smoothies because that would take too long. These fruits are definitely not going into Blink's smoothie, because they have started sprouting new leaves and stems and tendrils with which to walk, waddle, and drag themselves out of the case and onto the counters. The other waiting customers look confused at first, until one person shrieks, and then all hell breaks loose. Blink sucks in a breath through her teeth as a coconut rolls along the counter like a bowling ball and launches itself at the panicking people. A bright flare of purple light intercepts the coconut, slicing it in half mid-air to spill meat and water all across the floor. She doesn't really have time to celebrate. There are several apples dragging themselves out by still-growing stem-legs, and a big prickly pineapple lumbering in their wake. "Hey, everyone can you please stay calm and stop -- oof!" The large man who just bowled her over is probably not listening to instructions here. "I have this under -- ow!" This as an orange sails through the air and dive-bombs her. As the woman wandered into the food court, the redhead had turned over as she felt someone behind her. She looked to see the woman with the magenta streak in her black hair, not anything too out of the ordinary. Jade couldn't see the front of her, only her back, taking notice of the decorated back of her hoodie. However, the very peculiar thing was the long pointy ears of the woman, not really peculiar in the grand scheme of things. Just meant that she was a mutant, just like Jade. Make no mistake, she was looking at her to see what would go down in the next few minutes. "Shouldn' be too mucha a big thing, is just fruits inna blender." The redhead said to herself, throwing the trash away in the bin whilst turning her head to focus on what was going on over there. It didn't look like a situation that anything grand could come out of, especially with even a little bit of context to say the least. She gasped quietly as she saw that the fruits inside of the blender grew leaves, stems and longer tendrils like someone applied growth serum to the fruits. As they dragged themselves toward any and seemingly everything, she knew it was gonna be quite the commotion. Jade winced as she saw the coconut roll over shortly before cannonballing itself at the crowd of confused and scared citizens. She looked to see the flare of purple light slice the coconut in half as it's contents now spilled and made the floor slippery. The pineapple and the apples and the orange was a lot to keep up with it. Jade watched and sighed as she saw the fruits still coming. The redhead clenched her fists and bent her elbows, screaming and thankfully a small ball of fire came out, burning two of the apples. She stopped, making her way quickly to where the woman was, spitting out a mid sized ball of flame at the orange. "I hope yer on my side, Hun." Blink is only picking herself back up and flinches as the orange comes flying at her. Scratch that, as the burning orange comes flying at her, but the fire has fouled its aim, and the fruit flambé tumbles to the floor with a splat, emitting a horrible hiss that probably is just the juice sizzling and not a cry of pain, right? Probably. "Hey, thanks! I don't want to compare apples and oranges, but look out!" Blink cries, pointing at the (only lightly charred) apples as they change course to attack Jade. They have a bigger problem coming: the pineapple has grown an entire spike-leafed pineapple plant and is spinning toward them like some kind of refreshing tropical beyblade of death (or at least of very unpleasant prickly cuts). Blink chops the pineapple plant in...well, not quite half. It keeps coming, if slower and more messily. "Isabella!" she's calling to the teenager cowering behind the counter. "It's okay, take a few deep breaths, alright?" This might be a tall order, with an entire bunch of grapes rearing up on its vines to hurl...bits of itself at the girl. She looked for just a second as the other picked herself back up as the burning orange flambé went onto the ground, the hiss only mildly irritating to her ear lobes. The redhead turned around and breathed in for a second, this time thank heavens the ball was quite plentiful. It obliterated the apples, but the bigger problem was unfolding in front of their eyes. As the pineapples became spikey and began spinning themselves toward them like a fruity rock, boulder rather. Jade breathed in, spitting out fire both times, the first one was miniscule, just slightly charring the left half of the pineapple. The other one propelled itself to the right half, obliterating that one, to which Jade moved her and the other out of the way. She softly grabbed blinks hoodie and yanked her out of the way. The redhead stood tall, looking as some grapes speared towards the teenager behind the counter and blink began talking to the other. "Sorry, had ta move ya out the way there. Names Jade, codename Spitfire." Blink lets out a not-very-superhero-y "eep!" when Jade yoinks her out of the path of exploding pineapple. "Oh wow thanks!" comes out in a rush. A swirling purple portal appears under the grapes and drops them somewhere beyond sight, though a few seconds later grapes are splatting down from on high across the liberally juiced food court. "C'mon!" Is Blink talking to Jade? The terrified mutant teen? Probably both, because there are sirens in the distance coming closer. She opens another purple portal and waves the other two through, and they emerge on the next floor up. She slumps against the railing and peers down at the sweet, sweet carnage. "Hey, so. Isabella, there's a whole speech I came to give you, but we should get you somewhere safe first. Thank you...wait do you want me to call you Jade or Spitfire?" She shakes her head and laughs sheepishly. "I'm Blink, codename...Blink." The woman giggled as she heard the little squeak that left the other as she got her out of the way of the rolling pineapple. She looked over as she saw the portal emerge and teleport the grapes to somewhere else entirely, probably another dimension. It was very anticlimactic as she heard the grapes drop behind her at the food court. The redhead heard the sirens getting closer and closer to this destination. The woman looked as the three were now on the upper floor of the mall, rather the second floor. Jade looked down to see all of the massacre, the sweet mutated massacre. She giggled as she heard the other laugh sheepishly and had to stop herself from snorting. The redheaded mutant composed herself and said. "New addition ta the city, and as ya can see, a mutant as well. Made tha name up mah self, but call me Jade." "It's the city for mutants," Blink says with a kind of forced-chipper smile as she pulls her hood up and ushers the others away from the railing and away from the central well of the mall. "It's probably best to get out of here quietly." The teenager is looking back and forth between the two women. "Um. I'm definitely going to lose my job, right?" Blink bites her lower lip. "I don't know. If this has happened a few times already, they might know it's you this time. But I know some people who can help you figure some things out with your family, and school, and everything." She looks at Jade. "My portals can't go very far, but I can drop you somewhere safe." The woman looked at the other as she pulled her hood up and went away from the railing. She hopped over to where the other stood, listening to her as she suggested getting out of there without a sound. "That'll work, as long as it's not within any spittin' distance a any a these cops. I hope you find her some good place ta live, especially afta this incident, lord knows mutants got it tough already." Jade replied, putting her hood on her head and playing with her tongue piercing in her mouth just a bit. The redhead had begun questioning what place could help her with it, namely these powers as she overheard that there was such a place, supposedly. "There's a place to help mutants out? You mean I could learn to live with this?" "Well, it's a high school." Blink says with an uncertain glance at Jade. "But yeah, lots of people do learn to live with mutations." She leads them back down to the ground level on the other side of the mall and portals them across the street, past the clutter of NYPD patrol cars. "If you feel safe going home," she tells Isabella, handing her a card, "look over the school's website with your family. It's definitely not your only option, but it's worth investigating, okay?" The teenager takes the card, glances back fretfully in the direction of the police cars, gives a firm nod, and skitters off. Blink breathes out slowly. "Oh man, that was crazy. The bottoms of my shoes are still sticky ugh." She smiles at Jade, much less nervously now that the teenager has left. "Thanks again for helping out, that was kind of a mess! But nobody got hurt, at least. You said codename...Spitfire? You go around doing stuff like that a lot?" "Eugh, teenagers." She said, sighing as it seemed like all was lost. "I mean, damn guess ah'll have to find other ways a dealin' wit these powers." Jade retorted, looking at her palms as the three went down to the ground level and portaled across the street, avoiding the coppers. She sighed as it looked like there wouldn't be really anyone who could help her. Maybe it wasn't for Jade to get help from other people, maybe it was a journey she had to venture on her own. "Yeah, it was crazy, thank God ah didn't wear ma sandals or ma platforms, those my babies." She said, looking at the other. Blink was very calm compared to when the teen was around. But fair enough, Jade was a little bit off tilt with them around anyways. "When these powers actually work, yea. But they been goin' haywire the past few days, can't go ta a hospital, but can't go anywhere else. S'hard." The redhead sighed, putting her hands in her pockets and looking at a building. "It can be rough," Blink agrees sympathetically. "Sometimes there's really nothing for it but trial and error. Which..." She sucks in a deep breath. "...is extra rough when you have a really destructive power, I totally get that. Fire going haywire, not great! There's a mutant clinic in the Lower East Side. Not a full hospital, but it's your best bet if you have a volatile power. I don't have a card for them handy, unfortunately!" She laughs awkwardly. "But it's called Mendel Clinic, you can check out their website. There's a whole community around here, though. We help each other out however we can. Sometimes things are just...hard." "Don't need a clinic. S'not the problem of em going haywire, they just fluctuate like crazy." She looked as the other sucked in a deep breath. "The lower east side, I haven' been in New York fa long, but that name don't sound like a place ah should go, specially with these powers goin like this." As Jade found out she couldn't get some actual help with controlling her powers, she pouted just a bit and put her hands in her pockets even deeper. Didn't help at the awkward laugh from blink, she was a great girl, helping to fight off those fruits, but it wasn't the time. Blink starts to object, then reconsiders. "I mean, I don't know why your powers in particular would be dangerous there. The Lower East Side has pretty much the highest density of mutants in the city. It's where a lot of mutant community stuff is centered, but it's also where Purifiers go when they want to beat the crap out of us." She holds up both hands palm-up like she's weighing something in each palm. "Safety, community, it's not one or the other, it's much more complicated, but you have to balance what's important to you, and what's possible for you. Like, some people find it's safer to be closeted, I get that. But some people." She points at her own face with a rueful smile. "Can't." She looked as the other commenced to speaking, she calmed down a bit as the other started. "Only reason ah could think of is the fact they based on something ah don't know. And a power yah don't know is very dangerous, I wouldn't wanna go endangerin' them over there, even if it is just a mutant community, cause ah don't know if all of em can survive an accidental flare up." Jade replied, looking to see Blink weighing something imaginary in both hands. "Yeah, but ah also don't wanna put people in danger cause ah want some help. It's bettah for ya because ya haven't got such a big devastatin' power, at least from what I've seen. It's prolly a gud, pretty high level ability once ya get down ta it." Blink takes a deep breath and lets it back out slowly. Her fingers flex and she shoves both hands into the pockets of her hoodie. "I think very few of us really know how our powers work. Which is all the more reason not to make assumptions about other people's powers. A lot of us are very dangerous, to ourselves and to people around us." She shrugs tightly. "But there are a lot of dangerous things, we find a way to live anyway. You know driving on the highway is more likely to kill you than pretty much anything people think of as 'dangerous'? I like to think about that to keep things in perspective." She forces a smile. "But also, I don't drive." "Yeah, s'true, but it'd be a fools errand to go, not knowing what damage ya could or couldn't cause, I'm not gonna assume that just because they mutants that they can survive a flare up. Ah, ah wish there was someone who could actually permanently help instead a patching a growing problem. Cause as much as ah want help, can't keep putting bandaids on a large gash, ya know? Don't wanna turn it inta somethin' worse like a full blown ampya tation." She sighed and softly giggled at herself as she heard her accent and it was getting worse by the second. That's what Jade really sounded like, second to second? Minute to minute, it was very funny to her actually. At least the redhead could laugh in this moment. Blink is frowning deeply. "I mean. Isn't that the same problem anywhere? Mutants aren't more or less flammable than anyone else." Her mouth pulls off to one side. "On average. But I mean you were just sitting in a mall full of people, and I assume you also live in a building full of people, where you don't know what damage you might cause if you have a flare up. You make choices about managing the danger there, you can make choices about managing it elsewhere. And if you really feel like you can't, or don't want to? You can take power suppression drugs. I wouldn't recommend that, it feels terrible." She takes one hand from her pocket, summons a ball of purple light into her palm, and then lets it dissipate again. "But it's safer. And it's another choice you can make."