Logs:Unfinished Work

Unfinished Work
Dramatis Personae DJ, Steve	2022-05-24 "Hell is much less sci fi."
Location <NYC> Chimaera Arts - Dumbo
This is just one of the many abandoned warehouses in DUMBO, and like many of them it has recently changed hands. Unlike most of those, however, it does not have some corporate developer's sign out front promising a transformation into luxury condominiums or a boutique shopping center or the latest concept restaurant. Instead it's marked by a piece of weathered but wildly colorful plywood propped up on a stack of broken pallets, which reads "Chimaera Art Space!" above "chimaera.org" in smaller letters. The warehouse is moderately large and decorated with graffiti art in various styles--some of it recognizable as the work of renowned local street artists. A pair of monstrous scrap metal sculptures, perhaps still works in progress, flank the entrance. The building itself has undergone significant renovation recently, complete with wiring, plumbing, and a modular partitioning system. The grounds, too, have been cleaned up, ramshackle fences torn down and rusting detritus removed in favor of reclaimed (and brilliantly repainted) outdoor furniture ringing an impressively engineered firepit. This late at night, it's very quiet around Chimaera. There's a pair of medics draped over each other fast asleep on the couch, a young woman with deep sleepless bags under her eyes scrubbing dishes in the kitchen, a light or two on in the partitioned stalls for individual work, and not much else by way of people in sight. Though the doors to outside haven't opened in some time, a light goes on in the mostly-disused woodshop. For a good while it is quiet in there, but eventually the heavy hum of the planer starts up. Inside, in his usual flannel and jeans and boots, with a mask on and protective glasses, DJ is running his fingers lightly over one side of a notched plank of wood before passing it through the machine again. Steve has a stack of the Carebear collective's red Radio Flyer wagons -- empty now of the food, water, and other supplies they were used to distribute earlier -- balanced easily on one shoulder as enters the warehouse. He's pulled on a lightweight blue-green plaid flannel in deference to the chill in the air outside, but has not buttoned it over his black t-shirt with NEVER AGAIN printed across the chest in yellow letters, his sturdy jeans dirty at the knees and his black combat boots much-scuffed, the shield slung across his back is painted up with Friend Bear's crossed sunflowers. Someone has stuck his pink velcro armband on his head like a crooked crown (or halo), and he has either not bothered removing it or has not noticed at all. He deposits the wagons in storage, admirably quiet but for all that not silent, then starts to leave, his steps quiet, too. Stops at the sound of the machinery coming from the woodshop. See the light under the door. Swallows. Starts to walk away. Stops again. Heaves a soft frustrated sigh before finally going to the door and knocking out "Shave and a Haircut", just loud enough to be audible above the sound of the planing from within. There's not an immediate answer, the planer still buzzing for a few moments after Steve's knock. The machine goes quiet -- the room goes quiet. There are no footsteps before DJ pulls the door open, stopping frozen with his hand on the handle and his eyes slightly wide. "-- sorry," he collects himself to say. "If it's too loud I can -- come back later." "Hey," is all Steve manages for a moment, apparently flummoxed by the apology. Recovers half a beat later, his own eyes wider, too. "No, no it's not -- not that I've noticed. There's hardly anyone here, this hour." He glances over his own shoulder as if to confirm his claim, little though he can see any of the few people still lingering. "Sorry to interrupt your work, I ah...just wanted to say hi. And I was curious. You're a bit of a legend around the collective now, our very own phantom woodworker." He winces. "Figuratively. No one thinks you're actually a ghost." Then a more quiet addition, "Probably." DJ blushes, his eyes lowering. "No? Kinda am one, though." He hesitates a long moment, hand still on the door handle and an uncomfortable silence dropping leaden between them. It takes a moment before he looks back up, steps back to pull the door open wider for Steve. Inside there are far fewer projects in progress than there were in the days when classes were regularly held here. In one corner the disassembled pieces of a rocking chair sit beside a half-finished drafting table and a small square plank of tabletop, unsanded and unfinished in ebony and maple burl in intricate geometric patterning. He gestures stiffly with his mechanical hand towards the tabletop. "Just -- trying to get through what's left in his section here. It's, ah -- a lot slower going than it used to be." "Well. You're alive, so that's at least one strike against your ah, phantom cred." This last word sounds a little stilted, a little unnatural on Steve's lips. He's trying. When DJ pulls the door the rest of the way open he doesn't hesitate stepping through, but once inside he stops. Gazes around him with an expression that might be stricken if he weren't struggling to keep it neutral. When he finally does move again he's drawn unerringly to the maple burl tabletop. Reaches out but does not quite touch the rough surface of the wood. "I...I didn't come here to chatter at you about him, but." His pale blue eyes flick to DJ's flesh-colored prosthetic arm. "He had specialized. Hands. For this. Not sure that's something you'd want, but it seemed to help." "Am I? At this point I don't know how I'd tell. For all I know, this is hell." DJ shuts the door behind Steve, trailing slowly in the other man's wake. His eyes follow Steve's hand toward the tabletop. "Trying to get the legs done for that right now. If you like it, I..." He trails off, one arm curling slowly across his chest before he changes tack reluctantly. "Well, it'll probably still be a while." His fingers curl hard around his plastic arm, squeezing down tight. "I barely know how to use this, I don't -- know if a special hand would help." He's moving back towards the leg piece he's been working on, but stops before picking it back up. "... how did he lose his arm?" "Guess I don't have any compelling argument against that." Steve frowns. "Even for myself. 'This is the Bad Place' might be more plausible than 'got frozen in arctic sea ice and woke up the next century'." He raises his eyebrows. "Oh this --" Looks back down at the tabletop. Blushes. "This was part of a set, for me and Sam's apartment." He blinks hard. Looks up at the ceiling, then over to DJ, gaze lingering on his prosthetic hand. "On a Prometheus raid. He almost died, though that was -- pretty routine for him on raids." The faintest quiver starts up in his hands, and he grips the edge of a workbench to still them. "But that happened years ago, and he'd had practice getting on without it or with replacements for it. Probably didn't hurt that B and Tony designed his cyborg arms, calibrated them specifically for him." "It does seem extremely farfetched. Frozen in a block of ice and woke up in the next century? Came through a hole torn in spacetime to a parallel universe? Hell," DJ says with no particular weight to his inflection, "is much less sci fi." His eyes narrow faintly at Tony's name, and he turns partially aside as though flinching from it. "I think I can live without some kind of cyborg upgrade, then." His eyes drop back to the tabletop, locking there a long and heavy moment. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to -- I can leave it, if you'd rather I --" He swallows hard as though that will clear the frustration choking off his words. "I don't know what I'm doing here." "Ma always said those comic books would rot my brain." Steve chuckles softly. "Yeah I -- wasn't sure you'd be too eager to work with him, and I don't mean to suggest you should. Just, it seemed a bit more complicated than --" He breaks off and runs a hand through his hair. "Well, it seemed complicated. As for the end tables. I think I'd like -- well, I should ask Sam how he feels about it. But I think it's sweet, what you're doing here." He gestures around him, vaguely. "I hope you're getting something out of it, too -- pouring yourself into art can be a solace in difficult times, but for the folks around the collective..." His head shakes, barely perceptible. "Don't think anyone wanted to throw out his projects, and I can hardly imagine anyone better qualified to see them through." He pushes away from the bench but does not go any further. At least his hands have stopped shaking. "Feels like a kind of closure for the collective, whether you mean it that way or not, whether the folks who wanted these pieces will still want them." DJ's gaze has now dropped to Steve's no-longer-shaking hands. His own hand clenches tighter around his arm, as if restraining from further movement. "I don't know what I mean by it. I've spent almost all my time in this world trying to get out of the shadow of this man who I..." He hesitates, chewing at the insides of his cheeks. "-- I'm not him, but I'm not not him. I want to know who he was. It always feels -- cruel to ask the people who knew him. But my whole world got inverted because of the hole he left when he died and I --" With an effort he wrenches his gaze away from Steve, back to the unfinished table. "... maybe I'm looking for some kind of closure, too." Steve's brows furrow. "Guess it's at least a bit of a pickle for just about everyone who knew him and now, you. More for some than others, and you..." His head shakes again, sharper this time. "...sure hit the nail on the head. It's not just that you look or sound like him. Heck I've tried thinking of you kind of like his twi -- identical twin, but you're not that, either. I don't know how to go about this in a way that's fair to you, and I wish to God I did. But as far as cruelty goes." He looks back at the tabletop, and for just a moment he doesn't seem to know how to continue the thought he left mid-sentence. "Thought I learned the hard way that trying to bury grief just puts it off, at best. Now it's looking a whole lot like I'm just doing the same darned thing with Dawson, and I won't have it." He blows out a long breath, tension easing fractionally from his powerful frame. "Don't know that I'm the best person to offer you closure but, if you want to know about him -- I'll talk." DJ tenses at twin, but his head is nodding slowly. He takes a step closer to Steve, his hand lifting and then falling back to wrap around his chest again. "You've -- had a lot to grieve. I don't want to add to that, but I -- if you're willing. I'd like to know." "So've you." Steve says quietly, his eyes tracking the uneasy movement of DJ's hand. "If you feel moved to talk about that, I'm game, too. Said I'd help you figure out how to cope with losing your world and it turns out I'm still figuring that how to cope with losing mine. But if there's one thing I'm good at it's getting up and trying again." He shifts his weight and settles a hand on DJ's right shoulder. Squeezes very gently and pulls the smaller man against his side. "You know...he taught me some woodworking. Real basic, but maybe enough to lend you a -- bit of help, while we talk?" DJ's shoulder tenses beneath Steve's hand, but it's a fleeting thing that melts rapidly away as he's drawn nearer. Some unseen wall there is crumbling, and he leans into Steve's side with a shaky exhale. "Yeah." It's a long moment before he pulls away. "Might be nice to build something together."