Log Dumps

[xmm_emma]

6/27/2007

There is something almost eerie about a greenhouse in a rainstorm and watching the raindrops fall and never hit. Despite the humidity in the conservatory (or perhaps because of it), it is where Emma has chosen to settle for an early lunch and meeting. She folds her napkin across her knee and leans forward to pass Percy a bottle of preserves. "...quite upset by the encounter and /asked/ us to find her."

More attentive to Emma than to the weather, but more attentive to the weather than to his meal, Percy fiddles with the preserves without really paying much attention to what he is doing. He sets them down after a moment and drums his fingers on the tailored, pinstriped black of his slacks. "Really," he says. He hunches his shoulders as his mind settles on the problem of a shapeshifter. "Well, my first instinct is telepathy, but she does still have access to his dampeners. Still, maybe she's not aware of the possibility -- I could ask the twins if they would know her."

"Mmm. If she has functional dampners, then we'll have to resort to other methods of tracking her down. Maybe one of her former colleagues? Erik is in contact with a few, from what I understand. Adel even suggested 'fixing' one of the more unstable ones." Emma spreads a shmear of fruit onto a bagel half and takes a bite.

Percy absently tears a small corner of his bagel half off of its main mass and nibbles it, looking up into the spatter of rain onto the thick glass. "Did he now?" He pops the bite into his mouth and scratches fingertips along the cleanly shaven line of his jaw. "That's an interesting idea. Is this, uhm, unstable person a usable resource, do you think?"

Emma chews slowly and puts the bagel down and wipes the tips of her fingers on the napkin. "Potentially. Adel has apparently had more interaction with her than I have. Though I don't know how eager he is to pick up the connections. I think she made him squeamish talking about dismemberment." She steals a bemused glance at Percy, then picks up a fork and stabs into the heart of a chilled and brightly festooned salad.

Percy blinks. "Dismemberment," he repeats. "Well. That's promising," he says, voice turning dry. He sits back a little in his seat and sets down his bagel, sliding his hands down over the front of his thighs. "Do you think you would be able to, er, fix Miss Crazy?"

"Possibly. It depends on what kind of damage is done. If it's simple personality or mental fracturing, then likely. It sounds like she may be more detached from her emotions than Sabella was." Emma pauses to chew the lettuce and tomato mouthful, fork dangling loosely between her fingers, her hand curled under her chin. "If it is chemically induced, then telepathic assistance may be limited. But in any case, she may be helpful in locating our elusive target. We should, however, put other resources on it."

Percy nods. "I concur," he says. "This -- woman, whoever she is, is not really one of our own resources, and I'd rather trust to what we have. I'll talk to the twins about whether they could identify her, and I'll put Harper and Felice on the job. Bloodhound -- well." He breathes a soft laugh and shakes his head, turning out his left hand as he picks up his fork with his right to spear some crisp romaine on the end of its tines. "He won't be much use until he can find a scent and know it's hers, or if she can shift that. But he's a decent enough tracker. I'll probably float it by Reed as well."

Emma mirrors the nod. "I trust we will locate her eventually." The fork is twirled, then her hand dropped to chase a cucumber slice around the plate. "How are the pawns settling? Purgatory is due to open soon. DO you have enough help?"

"Oh, I think so," Percy says, his tone mild but his smile a slow, amber-gleaming smirk. "I really do. Fever has been looking over the security arrangements for me; I think she's quite excited about it, really. I want as many there the first night as we can to give them a good idea of how the duty will work, and after opening I'll start siphoning the detail down to where we'd regularly want it."

"Good. Excitement is always a nice bonus for duty." She catches the smirk and returns a pleased smile for it, genuine pleasure in its languid stretch of confidence.

Percy settles back against his seat, his posture drooping into an indolent lounge as dark lashes lower over his eyes. "If she's engaged, I think she'll do better work," he says. "I've heard from her, Listener, Spiderbite, Zenith, Beckah and Eisenberg, all go for the opening. I've still got to discuss it with a few of the others."

Emma purrs in approval, washing across him with a pulse of pleasure as she presses the tines of her fork against her lips, creating little indentations in their pillowed-fullness. She stares up and over his head at rivulets of water running down the glass walls. "Things are going well, aren't they Percy? Finally."

Percy rolls his head back on his shoulders, baring the pale curve of his throat as he lets his lazy glance slide along the ceiling. "Mmm," he says. It is certainly a more relaxed posture than one may have seen out of him of late. "Fairly, I think. Fairly well." He marks his own hedging with wry amusement, lashes fanning dark and thick over his cheeks as he closes his eyes and inhales. "I wonder what you think of our newest batch of Pawns, Emma?"

"They're capable. And a good deal more eager to make use of their advantages," Emma answers without hesitating, and without pulling her attention from the hypnotic run of rain. "They're not as polished as some of our older recruits, but that can be remedied."

Breathing a soft chuckle through the flash of his teeth, Percy sways forward and rests his elbows on his thighs, swinging his gaze around to fasten on Emma's features. "There's time enough for polish," he agrees. "I understand you had something of a run-in with Zenith before we nearly lost her to the elements."

Emma's eyes slip down to him and her brow lifts. "A run-in? Not precisely, though I suppose she left the encounter somewhat more... unbalanced than I did." She shrugs and sits back, folding her hands in her lap. "I was curious about her. She wasn't Sebastian's usual type. Though I suppose if given a few more years, she could attain some success with her gold-digging."

Percy laces his fingers together and rests his chin lightly on their pillow, watching Emma with amusement glinting in whiskeyed eyes. "Not his usual type," he says lightly. "You mean she's not blonde?"

Emma rolls her eyes and grants him a small, wry smirk. "Wealthy, vapid, and human."

"She does a passable imitation of at least one of those," Percy says, maybe not the most charitable he has ever been. "I'd like to get her an agent and an article in Variety, probably in that order. I think you may want to find a way of letting her know that you're pleased she's not dead at the bottom of the Pacific somewhere."

"Like what? Should I gift-wrap a male escort and deliver it to her door?" Emma isn't serious. Entirely.

Percy cocks an eyebrow at her. "I wouldn't rule it out," he says, "but /do/ send a card."

"Maybe one of those singing telegram services? I'm sure they could craft a suitable limerick."

"Fuck has some decent rhymes," Percy answers blithely, tapping his thumbs together. "Pussy, less so. Really, Emma." He clicks his tongue at her, fighting his smile away. "She's not a difficult one. She responds very well to positive reinforcement."

"Are you recommending escort services, or poetry lessons?" Emma exhales and rolls her eyes, but huffs a drawled, "Fiiine. I'll stroke her. She has her uses."

"Thank you," Percy says. He makes a face at her. "You'd think I'd asked you to dig a ditch of some kind. -- We still have the board at Mus Musculus in our pocket, right?"

Emma makes one back. "We /are/ the board of Mus Muculus. Unofficially. Why?"

"Beckah," Percy replies, relishing the hard consonant in the middle of the name, "has found us a mutant. Computer savvy. Programmer of no small skill, apparently, although I don't have a read on just /how/ good. I've talked to Adel and he knows her, so he's going to poke after her. I imagine we might arrange--" He lifts his hand and wiggles his fingers with the brief flash of a grin. "--a match. If all goes well."

"Ooo." Emma is interested. "We could certainly use her. Proceed. But while are on the subject of new mutants, there's a new one that may show up around Emerson. Dumber than a bag of rock, but since that is his interest, no loss, I suppose. Concussive force, or something along those lines. Last name is Masters. Should tell Bahir to keep an eye out for him."

Percy raises his eyebrows. "Is he public?"

"Unknown, but he has already had contact with Grey."

Percy crinkles his nose. "Of course he has," he says. "Well. Perhaps you can make an in there regardless. How does he feel about blondes?"

Emma leans forward on an elbow and cups her chin. "You might have better luck with balds. He was rather fixated on the school, mentally."

"But I don't have any hot bald sexpots in my arsenal."

"Shave Zenith's head?" Her eyes widen in sweet innocence.

Percy slants Emma a suspicious look. "You do have it in for her, don't you?"

The sugar-facade dissolves into a more genuine laugh and headshake. "Not really. You're the one who brought her up."

Percy makes an unconvinced noise and slouches back into the seat again. "I'll mention him to Bahir as something to look out for, but if Xavier's already got fingers all over him, we may end up just watching," he says.

"Of course, darling." Emma reaches across the table to spear a bit of salad from his plate. "Whatever you say."

Percy looks down at his plate, and then back at her. "I don't think I was very hungry," he confides. He nudges at his fork idly with two fingers. "I think that is all I had for now. Business-wise, anyway."

"Then enough business. Tell me how fabulous I look," Emma prods with a wink and sinks back into her chair, lacing her fingers across her lap and laughing. The rain drizzles on over head, wrapping them in a cacoon of soothing sound and grey air.

6.27.06 - Sulk.


7/7/2007

Magneto's personal restroom is very clean, with black iron tiling and stainless still furnishings. There is still a bit of haze lingering around the lights overhead, and a wet towel has been slung a little lazily over the open door.

Leaned over with one hand braced over the steel of his sink, vibrant blue collar open and matching tie snaked loose about his neck over the black of his suit, Erik has not been awake for too terribly long, nor does he look particularly well rested. The silver of his hair still damp and dark, he is trimming his beard -- the low buzz of the mechanical device in his right hand making conversation somewhat inconvenient. But he is nearly finished.

Knuckles rat-a-tat-tat at the outer door, and then Adel pushes his way in. He moves no farther than that first step, but he still takes it without particularly waiting. Pawns remain at station outside, barely blinking. "Good -- afternoon, Dr. Lensherr," he calls with a marked pause.

BZZZZzzzzzzzz. Click. Erik straightens when the door opens, and turns to squint a little irritably back in the direction of the interruption. This accomplished, he turns back to study his reflection, chin lifted and then turned aside to expose a rough patch. "Bahir?" Bzzzzzzz.

"Adel," he must disappoint. "I thought I'd come play Bishop." Leaning against the doorframe, he glances toward the bathroom door and then away again, waiting for Erik to emerge. He's a slouch of soft, pale colors: bone and sand. "What do you think of our visitor?"

"Ngh," says Erik to his reflection, cold eyes going all the more frigid. He is obviously excited about the prospect. The buzzing halts again, and another examination is carried out, this time followed by his left hand brushing carefully over neck and jaw. "I'm not certain."

"No one is. Not the pawns, not me, not Percy -- not Emma." Adel's head tips back, studying the lines of metal in the office. "Just by being here, she, whatever she is, creates chaos and makes pawns wary and uncertain. Emma and I speculated that she isn't the target," he adds, pushing off the wall to stroll to the door into the bedroom that he might lean through it and glance toward the bathroom more directly. "You may be."

Greyish stubble brushed from the blue of his collar with brows knit and the corners of his mouth downturned firmly into a frown, Erik locks the trimmer down into its charger while he listens, only to stiff and still in the midst of reaching to knot his tie into place. A bristle is evident in his silence, prickling and faintly dangerous. Suddenly the conversation is a minefield. Slooowly, still glaring hard at his reflection, Erik resumes a flick and tug at the base of his throat. "Thus far there has been nothing to indicate that she is /targeting/ anyone."

"Her existence is indication of it," Adel says, professionally paranoid. "Her existence is trouble, and troubling. You have been frustrated for some time, am I correct? And here comes this thing with memories of you--."

<< ERIK! >> The mental flash lashes out towards its target and leaks messily all along it path a moment before Emma flings the door open and storms into the room. She is barefoot, but the intensity of her focus makes up for the inches lost to the absence of heels. "Where were you last night?" she demands, then and only then, notices Adel. She holds a hand up to hold him in place.

The blunt of Erik's nose rankles on the edge of another forbidding silence. His mouth presses thin, and the triangle of his Windsor knot is jerked stiffly up into place in time for him to round on the door, and on Adel. Unfortunately, before he can get much further than that, he balks back from Emma's telepathic bellow and snaps his attention over onto the door, caught flatly off guard. "Where were /you/?"

Little kid caught between Mommy and Daddy fighting, Adel looks from one to the other uncertainly. Despite the upraised hand, he vacates the doorway to slide around the doorframe and lean against the wall inside the bedroom -- all the better for Emma to swoop down upon Magneto should she choose.

"I certainly wasn't out having a tryst with Charles Xavier," Emma snaps as she chooses to stalk across the room to the vacated doorway and intrude into the bedroom.

Magneto's bedroom is roughly how one might expect it to look. Black iron floors and walls, sparse black and metallic furnishings, a king-sized bed with a grey comforter and black sheets. The lighting is insufficient. The air conditioning is not. Meanwhile, mouth already open to fire back an irritable retort, Erik closes it again to knit his brows at her instead. Ok?

Adel laces his hands together at the small of his back and looks innocent. He considers the bed curiously. Big bed.

Erik's lack of response stalls Emma a little. She stops just inside the doorway, lifting her brows and jutting her head. "So why were you?"

"I wasn't." Gruff and irritable, with patience running thin on little sleep, Erik looks Emma over rather as if he suspects that she is mildly disabled and then turns to pace back for Adel.

"Then Xavier was either testing me, or he had a /very/ convincing fantasy concerning you and your helmet last night. Though I suppose the questions about your physique were probably telling." Emma rocks back and folds her arms in front of her, challenging him in expression and posture.

Adel refrains from whistling innocently.

Magneto stops and straightens, broad shoulders and long limbs flattered by the cut of his suit, but certainly no less wiry or more notable than they've been in weeks past. Adel is eyed and his jaw is worked, daring the younger mutant to say /anything/ at all, and he half-turns staunchly back to narrow his eyes at Emma. "What is this? Jealousy? Some form of obscure manifestation of --"

Adel says NOTHING.

Emma is not silent. "Not on my part, certainly, though I won't vouch for any lack of possessiveness on his. He accused /me/ of being responsible for whatever alterations in your behavior he was privy to. I think we have the person responsible for our mystery guest." Her chin tips up defiantly and she stands her ground without moving.

Magneto gruffs a low sound in the base of his throat that is too unintelligable to be interpreted as anything other than irritation and frustration recovering from a sideswipe of confusion. "I did /not/ see Charles last night, and there is /nothing/ to prove that /anyone/ is /responsible/ for our /guest/."

Adel's hand lifts. "Wait. Dr. Lensherr, you say you weren't there. That's easily verifiable, but I will assume it is true. But Dr. Xavier says that he was visited last night? Maybe it was Mystique."

"/Someone/ is, Erik. Someone /has/ to be. Unless you we are to start considering reincarnation or alternate realities, she does. Not. Make. Sense." Emma exhales harshly and looks at Adel. "If he was, then someone is making /us/ a target for /them/. He made it abundantly clear that he now considers us an active threat."

There is not much argument to be made for that, and Erik glowers between them with poorly suppressed anger and frustration thick on every breath he manages to force through his teeth. "Both of you can read my thoughts. I can manipulate metal with my mind. All of us can do the impossible. You /want/ this to be a lie!"

"There's no way it can't be a lie," Adel says in reasonable fashion. "Manufactured memories in a shapeshifter's body? Have we seen this 'Sabitha' use her mutation? Have we considered the possibility that someone has altered Xavier's memory of last night? There are too many things possible, and all of them are dangerous."

"My god. And /you/ want it to be the truth," Emma breathes on a note of realization. "You /want/ her memories to be genuine, some how. Some way. /God/, Erik. Have you /seen/ what she says you've made of us?"

"Ask her to demonstrate her ability. Or force her. There are tests. DNA." Erik too makes a concentrated effort to be reasonable, brows hooded and posture uncharacteristically defensive. Until Emma speaks. Magnetism ripples near visible through the room all around, highlighting the likely reason for so much metal worked into the design for the first time, and Erik turns on her with eyes ablaze with cold heat. "Have you seen what we have made of ourselves?"

Oh, dear. Mommy and Daddy are fighting again. Adel lapses into silence.

The Rook comes to the party late, dismissing the chubby young female pawn that alerted him to dripping telepathic summons as he knocks on the frame of the outer door and comes in. Pawns peek behind, curious despite their training. Percy doesn't invade the violated sanctity of the King's bedroom, but he does come into the outer office.

"Scavengers," Emma spits back, the whites of her eyes becoming more pronounced at the thrum of magnetism. "Scavengers and roaches, hiding out in holes and hedges, trying to avoid the backlash of a broken government trying to satisfy humanity's thirst for blood."

"Revolution is a messy affair, my dear. You would know as much had you the capacity to consider it with the merest /shadow/ of pragmatism." Magnetism does not cease, and Erik is too busy bearing down upon Emma to pay much heed to fresh activity in his office.

Adel waves a mental finger or two in Percy's direction, but otherwise says little. He watches a great deal, however, Erik eyed narrowly -- and Emma, too.

Percy approaches the bedroom quietly, nostrils flaring at the threads of what he detects when he draws nearer. He comes to the doorway and halts, tipping his head slightly as he tucks his hands into the pockets of his jacket. << How pleasant, >> he has the sense not to snark aloud. << Are we preparing for the Boston style of tea party? >>

"And when the aftermath is worse than the state that precipitated the revolution?" Her hands drop to her sides, fingers flexing and bunching into white-knuckled fists. A heady sense of familiarity, of confidence and fear much mated, clings like a nimbus to her. << What now? >>

"Reconstruction." Increasingly aware of how combustively off topic the conversation has trekked, Erik does not stop until he is uncomfortably near, emotion long-suppressed lending foolhardy courage to his argument despite the distinct lack of a dampener at his ear. "Do not tear down what you do not understand, and take careful note of the fact that I have done nothing along the lines of what your prodigal pawn has suggested. I know what war entails."

Adel casts a glance over at Percy, gaze skimming past Emma before returning to Erik. Oh, how quiet he is.

"Whether this woman was sent to rattle us or not, the fact remains that she has done so," Percy says from just inside the doorway, his chin tipping up. He isn't quiet! Too cranky for cowardice, he rocks a little back on his heels and inserts himself vocally. << You're unsettling the Pawns. I think I am supposed to fix it. >> "She takes the form of a woman who tried to kill Emma. A former ... close friend of mine, who remembers my death. Who remembers Adel's. She remembers a war you never started, White King. Whether someone has aimed her at us or not, she is aimed at all of us. At all of our weak points, which should be strengths. Your cause, my loyalty, their very selves. Are we supposed to believe that this aim is accidental?"

"I do take note, Erik. That is why I /do/ believe her to be a lie." The answer is soft and smooth, the words carefully chosen and spoken as she lifts her face to his, eyes wide and wary, if clear. << I am little unsettled myself, >> she admits, then turns her head away from the White King to look at Adel. Another movements has her swung back on one foot, facing Percy and his interjection.

"It is highly suspicious. But not cause for immediate dismissal." Erik is slower in turning, with a cap placed upon the rough-edged anger in his voice, if not in his posture, or in the testosterone stink of him. "I want more information."

"All right," Adel says mildly. He finally speaks. "We all need more information. How do you propose to get it? Bahir tried, and Emma as well. We ought to speak to Xavier, as well. Either send Bahir trotting over, or do it yourself, Dr. Lensherr."

"I think we all want more information," Percy says, brow knitting as he cants a glance towards Emma. "I could try talking to her, to see if she will trust me enough to tell me what she wants, but I don't know what luck I will have where telepaths don't." He moistens his lips to swallow, not exactly relishing the prospect, but putting the option out there anyway. "Maybe if I did it with one of you," he glances towards Adel, and then Emma, "in, uh, earshot."

Emma wants her dead, that much is clear. She looks from Rook to Bishop to King and makes a face, but nods. "Who ever goes to deal with Xavier should carry a dampener. I don't know what his intention was, but if it was to provoke just such a visit, I would prefer we give him no further advantages." Emma looks to Percy, weighing the potential benefits and costs of his offer. "It may make her more vulnerable."

"Send Bahir." His head grated aside until his neck cracks, Erik draws in a deep breath, glares at all parties present, and turns for his own door. "Keep me apprised of anything new you should learn."

Glancing between Erik and Emma, Adel just nods slightly before looking to Percy. "If you have the time, you should sit in on Percy's little chat, Emma. You might catch a waver that my brother or I would miss." As for sending Bahir to send the wizard--? Not his job!

"I'll let Bahir know," Percy says. He frowns slightly, glancing to Emma. "You want me to send him with the dampener?" << Seems a little-- well, I'm not exactly ready to field test that particular ... >>

<< Unless he feels his powers are sufficient to stand up to an assault by Xavier? >> Emma answers sweetly, irritation and anger stirring underneath the communication. She'd go herself, but we've all read how /that/ goes! "Of course, Erik."

Past Percy and Adel. Through the door, into the office, and then out, Erik strides without another word, closed, irritable, and angry at the world.

Adel glances after Erik as he leaves, and then looks over at Emma with a lift of dark eyebrows. Oh well! "That's that, then. I'm going to go see what we have in the way of ice cream." And off he goes.

Percy stares after Adel incredulously. "Ice cream," he repeats.

And Emma stares after Percy. She rubs her temples with her fingers and follows the exiting path, mumbling darkly to herself and dripping general-purpose irritation.

7.7.07 - Not very lucky for anyone, it seems.


7/8/2007

=NYC= Purgatory - Greenwich Village - Manhattan

This not Dante's Purgatory, nor the Catholic. It is neither Heaven nor Hell. There are no fires, and no clouds. There is metal.

This is the purgatory of machines: metal twists around the table's edges and strikes down to meld into the floor, melting and flowing to rise again in the hard lines of railing and bars. There is one window, and it is fogged. The glass is reinforced, and then reinforced again. Warmth comes from lighting, which is ample but finely controlled; during the day, it is almost bright, and at night, the lights fall to a bare industrial gleam that pulses to the beat of music that originates from the raised platform to one side of the dance floor, on which the DJ sits enthroned. Booths and tables ring the walls, dancefloor sunken beneath the level of seats. There are softer chairs of cushions and metal, and couches too. The bar is a long and glossy, glassy thing. Bottles glitter. If it is alcoholic, they have it.

If excitement had a scent it would be this. Lines had started forming long before the sun went down, and the end was still wrapped around the corner, despite the inside of Purgatory being filled to capacity. There is probably something symbolic about that, but tonight is not the night to do much heavy thinking. Unless you're one of the telepaths stationed inside and outside the Club. Music pours into the hot night, creeping through doors and the lone reinforced window. Lights flash, glinting off tables and chairs, twisting around the bar to spill across the dance floor covered in bodies.

The music pours at the bidding of DJ Kali, the four-armed mistress of the turntables that is presiding from her raised booth at the head of the dance floor. Her red dreadlocks are held up by a pair of chopsticks, her tattoo-laced upper arms flashing about as she manages the music. A pair of large headphones reside at her ears, a third hand holding them there as she bobs her head with the sounds. Instead of being dressed up, she is wearing a t-shirt scissored into dramatic sleevelessness and a pair of baggy cargo pants, casual and at home. It is fashion, much like her heavy red makeup. Beckah is a happy DJ tonight!

On door duty and sullen about it, Bahir rejects people somewhat arbitrarily, and always rudely. He does his part to keep the line moving, even if 'moving' mostly means sending people off with a scathing comment aimed at their weakest points. He's great for business.

Nearer the door than the floor, Emma oversees the mix of people gyrating on the floor and deflects more than one alcohol-emboldened offer to join. Leather wraps around thighs and hips, then sneaks up to cross across her chest and up behind her neck, leaving abdomen and back and arms bared to the heavy humidity of the night. She glances aside, and smiles with little sympathy for the door-minding pawn.

Zenith is apparently trying to impress her employers with her dedication to duty, keeping herself out of the real fun for the moment. She's dressed summery, green halter top tied behind her neck and thick hair corralled up by chopsticks, teasing wink of a green stone in her navel stud, and then the slight flare of a black miniskirt that shows off the miles of her tanned legs. She moves with the music, a slight hip-sway, but leaning on a railing watching the floor, rather than down participating just yet.

"Excuse me," comes a voice obviously overpowered by the sound and noise and fury of the club itself. Celia is jostled to the side, trying somewhat in vain to keep herself upright and her place in line intact. Her attire is rougher, not entirely upscale or downscale, but somewhere nebulously in the middle. "I have a thing," she says, trying to show a slip of laminated paper on a cord to the bouncer from her place as eighth in line. The rest of the people in line aren't having it. "I'm late, but I have a thing." The thing, it seems, is a pass.

Official security is uniformed and paid, although one of them has a complexion and build remarkably similar to a block of granite, standing near the bar with his arms folded over the stony barrel of his chest. Sal Harper oversees them from the bouncer's station in caramel suede to match the dramatic, loose tumble of her dark wavy hair, muscle and curves caressed and enhanced in brown and gold.

Unofficial security throngs the club in party gear, and Fever oversees them in dark purple leather and the slashed old cotton of a vintage tee, snug against her skin.

Listener's station for tonight is the bar, and she has, at the bar, the kind of sugared rum and fruit drink that is concentrated sweet to the point of cloying. It has an umbrella. It is not pink, but blue. Receptive empathy lays over the crowd like a blanket, catching stray moods and chasing the sourer ones until she finds sources, usually only to dismiss them -- rejected for a dance, rejected for sex in the bathroom. Those who are silly enough to try speaking to her aloud are answered bitchily and monosyllabically; largely she is left alone.

Luke Eisenberg has dressed up for the club scene probably by watching taped episodes of What Not to Wear in the privacy of his apartment after a shift; the couture is not questionable, but there is something unsettled about the way he wears it, as though it is wrong for his skin. Collar turned up, one button undone, over a dark brown tee, and expensive jeans. He has a drink. It is beer. In a bottle. Yes.

Oh. Fever also has her horrible traffic flare orange sneakers. Just in case someone thought she might have forgotten them.

Adel has claimed the largest, coziest, most vaguely evil-mastermind-like chair there is, and he sets on it with a lazy stretch of limbs that declares the space his. He drinks from a glass with an umbrella, and looks smug. (His umbrella is pink.)

"You have a thing?" Bahir says, picking Celia out with a dark glance. "Is it sexually transmittable?"

Emma doesn't have an umbrella. This is somehow sad. She does a bottle of water that she swirls around the ridges as she moves to lean against a railing, unconsciously mimicking Zenith. We can't have that. Her lean has a purpose, albeit a mischievous one. Below her, Adel sprawls on his chair. So above him, the water bottle tips and a stream splashes out. She moves away from the railing and back into circulation.

"No," Celia says to Bahir, flustered too much to even really take offense at the implication. "A thing. A thing." Her arm raises up over her head to wave the pass, laminated and bearing the proper identification of a backstage pass, or its equivalent. "My friend is the DJ. I was supposed to be here an hour ago, except I wasn't." Her voice sounds strained and unaccustomed to being raised this much, and for extended periods of time.

Adel has been peed on. He shakes water from his hair as it dribbles down his collar, raising a shiver over golden skin. Rising to his feet, he moves after Emma, coming around to meet her with the slip of an arm about her waist. "That," he says crisply, "was not nice."

Bored now, Zenith heads for the bar by way of wandering by Fever in case of any additional directions, and also staying more or less the length of the room away from Emma. Coincidentally. Since her hands are sadly empty of a drink just yet, she hooks her thumbs into her waistband, hands spread. Luke's discomfort makes her grin as she passes near him, wobbling his beer in greeting.

It is not the first time of the night that the Rook has disappeared to the men's room to hide from the barrage of chemistry battering his senses, nor will it probably be the last, but he reemerges nonetheless. He resumes possession of his drink from Harper, who he made hold it, and then drifts onwards around the edges of the party, looking for somewhere to be. The crimson of his shirt slicks close to his skin, dark leather pants always appropriate to the club scene; golden turtles gleam in either ear; dark eyeliner rims both eyes; it has been awhile, but Percy has not, at least, forgotten how.

"Whose friend /isn't/ the DJ?" Rolling his eyes, Bahir waves Celia forward and gives a hard shove to the man in front of her who tries to capitalize on Celia's luck. He is briefly distracted and glances toward the taller man, then thumbs the street. "Leave. You -- girl. Go ahead." Celia gets in. Three others do not.

From her perch, Beckah is largely detatched from the crowd. It is probably not small wonder why she loves DJing so much - she is essentially lording over a throng of people moving at her musical whims. She is like a miniature Emma with less silicone up there. She has worked up a sweat since the party started and when a song comes to an end, her voice comes over the speakers, the music fading quiet. "I see so many of you out there with drinks, I'm getting jealous! Enjoy the music while I solve the problem!" A new song comes on, this time a 'break' CD put on. And Beckah dismounts her booth, to begin working her way through the dancefloor toward the bar. She is minorly mobbed, but nothing alarming. People wanting high-fives and to flirt or say hello.

Luke startles and nearly drops the bottle, which would make everything less fun for everybody! "H--" He huffs into a startled laugh as he tightens the possessive curl of his fingers around the dark glass of the bottle's neck. "Hey! Zenith." He gives her a friendly smile that grows just a little warmer with the skip of eyes down miles of leg and back up again. He points towards Beckah in a slightly dorky form of affirmation as she works her way across the room, and then looks back at Zenith. "Going well, isn't it?" (He doesn't go to clubs. He doesn't know.)

Scuttling past Bahir with a softly murmured apology, thanks, then another apology, Celia moves through the door and into Purgatory. Eyes still adjusting to the dark perceive the scene inside, the sound and the bodies and the smell of sweat and the lights and the motion that make her head want to spin and her eyes water. She is not at home here, and it shows starkly. Beckah's voice catches her attention, and she spies the DJ's platform, already empty. Even trying to skirt the dance floor entirely, there are still so many people that she is driven by instinct to the clearest space she can find, against the wall, not actually at the bar, but near it. There are no seat, and hence fewers people. "Excuse me," she mumbles softly, words barely carrying over the chattering conversation, much less the music.

Emma taps the bottom of the water bottle against her lips and grins. << Do you realize you just became the envy of seven different men in this crowd? >> she answers mentally, rather than trying to talk above the noise. She jerks her chin toward the mobbed Beckah and moves out of the way of the scuttling Celia.

Bahir takes out the indignity of having to let someone through by turning away half a dozen more, even when a drunken trio leave to make room for more inside. Nope! Too bad!

<< You're the one who made me wet. >> Adel is, as always, subtle. He follows the path of Emma's gaze with a slight smile, and then gives her a peck on the cheek, disengaging to simply stand next to her. << Haven't had any trouble. It's like Percy's doing his job, or something. >>

Zenith reaches up to tug playfully at one side of that turned-up collar. "You should dance at some point. I'll come back and drag you out there if I need to!" With that threat, she heads for the group around Beckah, not presuming to fight her way to the front, but with a wave of encouragement from the back should eyes turn her way.

<< Just returning the favor. >> Emma is equally subtle. << You would think. He's going to be so wrung out by the end of the evening. I almost fear to charge Bahir with seeing him home. >>

Luckily for Beckah's sanity, she is capable of shaking and slapping hands at twice the normal human rate! It takes a minute or two, but she eventually dislodges herself from the dancefloor and worms her way toward the bar. In the process, she spots Zenith first and gives her a wave and a little grin, "Hey! How's it going?" She calls, while trying to get up to the bar to entreat upon the person tending it for a couple of bottles of water. In spite of her talk of drinks, she is staying sober. This presents her the opportunity to reach out and cup a hand at one of Meredith's shoulders. "Hey!" She calls again. Unfortunately, she does not yet spot the Celia lingering off to the side of the bar, the Frenchwoman missed in the crowd. At least Beckah is a good deal easier to spot.

Adel leaves subtlety aside to glance down the lines of Emma's body before looking up again and over the crowd. His smile fades to a brief downward twist. << Harper can see him home just as well, or Sauer. Pity he never learned better control, or maybe he wouldn't be so wrung out. >> That's right. Blame Percy.

Emma slides a glance to him out of the corner of her eye. I see you! << He wouldn't thank us for sending him home with Harper. Though she might. >>

Refreshed by his stint in the bathroom, Percy exchanges a few terse words with Fever. They split off soon enough, the purple-clad woman sliding smoothly out onto the dance floor to flirt and gyrate with the best of them, her motions as fluid and controlled as a martial artist's ought to be. They are also /remarkably/ fast, each throb of the music's beat given twice the motion it deserves. Her eyes are a blaze of orange and her dark skin hides the flush of heat but not the slick sweat.

Percy patrols on, hugging the walls rather than the floor, and keeps an eye on things with something slightly proprietary to his air.

Threatened with dancing, Luke drinks his beer and watches Zenith's ass as she moves on.

(How not?)

Now with the pass securely around her neck, but not so securely that she doesn't still hold onto it with both hands, Celia inches further along the edge of the bar, muttering excuses, apologies, and a few short curses when jostled. She lifts her head at the call from a familiar voice, but her shoulders fall when she finds out it wasn't directed at her. She is lost, like a lamb waiting for her shepherd. "Beckah," she says firmly more than yells, feeling like the last twenty yards between the pair is utterly unnavigable for all the people in her way.

"Yo," Listener says to Celia from her perch just a barstool away, surfacing with a slurped sip through her brightly-colored straw. "I got it." She unearths her bright blue umbrella from the drink, licks its drink-wetted end, and then chucks it at the back of Beckah's head.

"Great!" Zenith calls back to Beckah. Since the bar was her original goal anyway, she wiggles her way up to it to be more or less next to the other woman. She has no qualms about ordering alcohol. "How're you--?" She blinks, distracted by at the chunked umbrella even if not directed at her, and her lips twitch as she waits for a reaction.

Adel's smile is sharp as he watches people dance, and he doesn't respond to Emma. He sips from his pink-umbrellad drink, attention elsewhere.

Four more people leave, and Bahir lets just one in. It's a wonder how the club managed to fill with his stingy door-minding.

Beckah's head tilts forward after Meredith's umbrella thwips against the back of her head. She turns slowly to look at the thrower with her brows raised, without lifting her head back up. Instead though, she spots that poor little lamb hiding by the wall and makes a rather loud squeal of happiness. Away from Zenith, past Meredith and right at Celia, like some four-armed puppy bounding along. "Hey! Cee!" Beck is quite used to the loud and has no hesitation to talk over it! There is a hug, whether Celia is ready for it or not. "You made it! I was worried something came up when I didn't see you earlier!"

Emma laughs as she moves away, circling the back edges of the room as well. Eventually Percy's and her path would cross, you think.

It does! Percy has drifted to a momentary halt, smiling slightly at the intersection of Beckah and Celia. He turns and finds Emma -- hey, right there. He lifts his drink in greeting, still half-finished after a growing ridiculous amount of time.

Emma salutes him with her empty water bottle. << Managing, darling? >> Though not dancing, the humidity leaves a sheen across the lines and curves of her exposed skin.

Encompassed by four well-muscled arms with her hands still primed to protect her club pass, Celia all but disappears from the neck down for a moment with her chin on Beckah's uppermost shoulders. She wheezes out something that sounds like a gasp and lets her tongue fall out overdramatically like a party favor over Beckah's shoulder. "I couldn't get a ride," she explains softly, a little red in the face but in no real danger. "It's very..." Celia pauses, her voice trailing off from the raised volume next to Beckah's ear as she pulls back from the hug. "It's very nice," she finishes uncertainly.

Zenith looks a little taken back at Beckah's abrupt departure, but she smiles a little seeing the hug, and collects her drink. Back to watch the dance floor! Of course, now she's preventing herself from dancing by holding liquid, she's back to watching again, little absent movements as she feels the music.

<< Fine, >> Percy acknowledges, sipping at the edge of his glass. << Been awhile, but there's a rhythm to it, can be a bit much over sustained periods but take a break every now and again, it's fine. >> He lowers it again and slides one heel behind him in a shift, too warm in the leather and sweaty in humidity and crowd. He gestures with a wide sweep of one manicured hand. << Going well. >>

The hug of doom is released when Celia pulls back and Beckah nods her back the way she came, "Come over here, get something to drink. You wanna climb up by my booth and stuff? Get out of the crowd?" Beckah is aware of Celia's discomfort and she is quick to try to relieve it. "I could introduce you to some good friends of mine, too!" Excitement is practically glowing off of the four-armed woman as she tries to lead Celia back to the spot Zenith just abandonned.

"Zenith," Adel says into her ear, coming up at her side with a grin as he looks over his shoulder. He lifts his glass at her. "Enjoying yourself? What do you think of it so far?" << --the work, I mean? >> he clarifies. The club is clearly awesome. Clearly.

Zenith lifts her glass in return, grin of greeting slighlty less than usual as her glaze slides off to try to locate Emma in the ground, annoyance pricking over a brief notice of them together, earlier. "Way too much fun to be work," she says, voice still light. "Or will I jinx us if I say that?"

<< If you get a little out of hand, darling, just let one of us know, >> she warns and offers as she leans in to tickle his ear with a fingertip brush and moves past, continuing her circuit.

"Nope," Adel says, a happy pop of sound. "No jinx. Just perfect. I'm glad you're enjoying it. I don't think my brother is enjoying his work so much." He is unsympathetic.

Celia nods, a little dumbly, a lost child being offered the help it wanted but wouldn't actually ask for. "If it's allowed," she amends the nod. The way she stays just in Beckah's shadow, it's obvious which is leading the miniature procession and which isn't quite at home on the other's turf. "A drink?" the Frenchwoman asks, voice loud enough to carry on only the second try, then segues easily into, "Your friends?"

Once the pair of DJ and out-of-place Celia make it back to the bar entirely, the man behind it quickly supplies Beckah with a couple of bottles of water, the plastic foggy from the cold of them. He immediately points at Celia, cueing her for an order. Beckah grins to her, "Yeah. A bunch of the people I work with and know and all are here. This is absolutely great! I'm getting paid to have the best party I've ever been to!" She finds the umbrella happy pawn, poking Meredith a /tad/ roughly in the ribs with an index finger. "Hey! Meredith! This is Celia, my best buddy." She points between the two women, "Cee, this is Meredith. One of my work-friend-people! She is very cool!"

Percy glances after Emma, and then continues on his own circling path. He angles in the vague direction of the front door to keep an eye on the bouncer and check out the line.
7.8.07 - Party!