10/19/07 - Magnes, Jason
---
=NYC= The Bronx
The Bronx has its upscale and its downscale, but the downscale is better known. Once, half of South Bronx burned to the ground in a series of deliberate arsons. If it's since rebuilt, The Bronx's reputation has hardly improved and tourists are comparitively few and wary -- despite the Bronx Zoo and Yankee Stadium. And South Bronx residents can tend toward the high octane, not malicious, but certainly energetic. Even trains have been lettered with elaborate graffiti, hip-hop and rap blare merrily into the streets, and The Bronx Cheer is very well slang for blowing a raspberry.
[This room is set watchable. Use alias TheBronx to watch here.]
"What do you think I am? Some kind of evil mastermind with power stealing abilities who plans to drug you with pizza and pluck out your brain?" Magnes hints, he hints -hard-, and really hopes this guy doesn't watch much TV.
What does Jason think Rossi is? The cop stalks down the street, his hands in his pockets, his shorn head bared to the breeze. Even when he ambles, he gives off the slightly aggressive quality of a hound on some scent. The green eyes are blank, seeing far and not seeing at all. Thought. He is deep in thought. Also, walking. Complex combination.
"If you were, it wouldn't be smart to tell me so." Jason now looks-- opposite the opposite. "But this sudden friendliness does not really excite my trust." And in looking opposite, the cop, that familiar angular outline, catches his attention. Oh.
Magnes feels a new body getting near, looking back with familiarity himself, then quickly darting his eyes to Jason and whispering. "Be cautious around this guy, he works in mutant affairs." he warns, not exactly trusting Rossi or his profession all that much.
News bulletin for Jason. Rossi veers around a moving body, attentive at least to motion, and finds himself caught by moving body's leash, which is attached to moving body's chihuahua. The two extricate each other, with much excitement from the animal, and there is new attention in the pale gaze that sweeps the street, absently marking other hazards. Like -- Magnes. Oh. The cop stops and simply looks at that young man, his eyebrows lowering over blankness. "You," he says, and then adds, resigned, "Fuck-a-duck. What did I do now?"
"Oh, gee. That's terrifying," Jason drawls through his teeth and unfolds his arms to slip his hands in his pocket. It is Rossi he watches, if he says nothing else.
The black brows crease around a furrow. "I don't," he says briefly. "I don't have pets. Got enough problems with the people. Question wasn't for you. Who's your friend?" he asks, with a quizzical glance at Jason. The detective nods to the apparent Asian, his face reserved. The bleakness of past illness still haunts his face, digging shadows around his eyes and cheekbones. And then there is his haircut -- but it's cool. It's all cool. "Rossi," he directs towards the new face. "Chris Rossi."
"Askatzik Chong," Jason identifies himself without emotion. "That's me. And I'm not here to cause trouble" is said with that same emotionless drawl, only the merest bit bleak as if to match Rossi's-- afflictions.
Magnes raises an eyebrow at Jason's first name, but just shakes it off. "We just met, I believe we were about to go have pizza, would you like to join us, Mr. Rossi?" he offers while blinking innocently a few times, giving his most naive looking smile, even throwing in a head tilt.
"Askatzik," Rossi repeats, zipping the name off with the New Yorker's panache: a lifetime of introductions involving complicated, esoteric names. He settles his weight on his heels, his arms akimbo, and arches his brow at Magnes with the baffled quality of one encountering a threadbare carnival exhibit marketed as new. "You just met and you're going to go have pizza? It turn out you were long-lost brothers or something? --Relax," he adds towards Jason, grimacing. "I'm not looking for a collar. He tell you I was a cop? Or just that I was a dick?"
"I haven't the faintest why he wants to go out with me. It happens with distressing frequence. A man steps out for a smoke, a man is accosted by some good-natured kook who wants to buy him pizza," and the bleakness is shed like a second skin. Jason is acting. "It does make a man suspect a sting operation. Pull the homeless off the street before they can pull property values down. And I'm not even homeless."
"I'm straight!" Magnes quickly defends after Jason mentions 'going out' with him, of course he takes it the wrong way and is always quickly defensive. "I just figured I'd share a pizza with a guy who helped me out a bit. And I think sting operations are usually done when there's a whole group of people getting..." he stops to search for a word, finally deciding on, "Stung."
Rossi's jaw stretches itself long, his mouth crimping into a cramped little grimace. He massages the hollowed cheeks with a hand, palm sliding across the rasp of bristle on the shadow-touched face. "Too many Midwesterners in town. --Not that friendly's not a bad thing," he says patiently, for Magnes's benefit, "but New Yorkers, man, they don't tend to like it when you get all up in their face with the 'be my bud' shit. It's a big city with a lot of people. You never heard the phrase 'good fences make good neighbors?'"
"I helped him out not a bit, which leads me to suspect that he either is both gay and desperate, or after something. I suppose," and Jason turns his face back toward Magnes, the suspicion all alight again, "that those two options are more or less the same thing."
"So far I've met three extremely bitchy females, you don't have to remind me of the New Yorker thing." Magnes frowns quickly at Jason, defending again, "I am not gay! Stop saying that. I think breasts are quite nice." Not that he's ever seen real ones.
Despite himself, the corner of Rossi's mouth slants up. Most of the expression is lost behind his paused hand. "In one direction," he tells 'Chong' with deadpan cynicism. "Not in the other. He can be after something and not be gay or desperate. --Fuck, kid, if three bitchy chicks in all this time is what you've met, you've got off lucky." He shifts his weight again, shoving his hand back into his pocket. The cheap suit jacket, pushed back by his arm, bares the leather holster and the gleam of his badge on his belt. "You got a knack for getting into stuff."
"Many gay men find breasts quite nice. Aesthetic. Circles." Jason, ah, draws a circle with his pinky. But he is again watching Rossi.
"Geometric," Rossi tacks on. Pose order, what? He grins briefly, suddenly, white teeth flashing with the green of black-spliced eyes.
"I like breasts for more straight guy reasons. I remember my first boob, it was so squishy and um, rubbery." Magnes is lying quite badly, but he must protect his sexuality! "I don't really like, get into stuff. The um, Mr. M things..." he censors for Jason's benefit. "Were all coincidences I'm pretty sure, and I wouldn't have gotten stabbed if that illusion guy wasn't there, talk about cheating."
"Mr. M. Again. I haven't the faintest what you are talking about." Jason's voice is cool, detatched, and his mind veers elsewhere. In the road behind, two large men emerge from the shadows, indistinct with distance, but approaching.
"Stabbed," Rossi says with lazy interest. His eyes hood themselves, an expression of deceptive drowsiness concealing the sharpness of their focus. "Illusion guy. Right. Because you could've taken him if it weren't for his spooky powers."
"It was his friend, he didn't do anything but hold me with them. I couldn't have taken his friend, but I could have dodged and not ended up on the ground." Magnes' eye twitches, realizing this is the first time he actually mentioned what really happened, to Rossi at least. "Don't worry about it, this isn't proper conversation in public." he says with a shrug, quoting directly from Trevor.
"No, it isn't," Jason says with that same apparent cool detachment as the men move in, more distinguishable in the half-light of the streetlamps now. They are massive indeed, unsubtle, but their manner, for now, more loitering than aggressive.
Green eyes flick a glance towards them, professionally assessing, before refocusing on Jason and Magnes. "'Don't worry about it,'" Rossi mocks, the rapid-fire pace of the Brooklyn accent ameliorated by the stretch of a drawl. He runs a hand over his head, raking his fingers through long hair that -- is no longer there. The shorter bristle rasps quietly, and prompts another grimace. "Hey, don't mention it. Not like what happens in mutant-land has anything to do with rule of law." He is only a little bit sarcastic. And the Atlantic is only a little bit wet.
Magnes squirms his shoulders, though this time it's more because his backpack is very heavy and he's been standing for a while. "Well what happens to me is my own business if I decide. No one can arrest her if I don't press charges, and I don't have intentions in doing so." He lets a 'her' slip, but he doesn't notice. "So stop doing your whole cop thing with me, I know the law."
And the two men shuffle a final few steps forward, almost in tandem. One voice projects low and dark-rough toward the crowd of three. "Kid. With the specs. We wanna talk to you." Jason's eyes turn all dark and mild on Magnes.
"No," Rossi says mildly. "You don't, jackass. Stabbing's a state charge, and keeping her identity to yourself's obstruction. She didn't accidentally drop a dog on your car and dent your hood." His gaze slews towards the two men, his eyebrows lowering in a renewed appraisal of the two. He redistributes his weight from one leg to both, his hand shoving idly back into his pockets. That the coat is thus pushed back to reveal his badge again is -- accidental. Maybe.
Magnes tilts his head, very uneasy, but remembers what Jean told him. Intangible mutants, just like Kitty, right? "Um, no thank you..." he declines, beginning to back up and whisper to Rossi, in this case he -does- trust the cop. "Dude, they're intangible, I think they're mutants or something, but you could walk right through them." he tries to make sure Jason can't hear, getting quite defensive as he peers at the two men, even going so far as to close his eyes from the uneasiness.
"Lookit," the second man gruffs out in a laugh. "He's cozyin' up to the cop." "Betcher the cop's a mutant, too," returns the first and steps another step forward. "It's cute. Liddle kid," is crooned most specifically at Magnes. "We jus' wants t'talk 'bout yer flappin' big lips is all." Jason in his shell subtly slips behind Rossi. Just trying to be inobtrusive.
Which puts Rossi at front and gives Jason, at least, a splendid view of the surgical scar that still shows dull red under the hair. "Mutant my ass," says the detective, slouching. Another deception: the lean body tightens under the loose jacket, weight sinking into the balls of feet for a quick answer, as needed. "You never heard of the NYPD's hiring policy? --It's a free sidewalk. US-fucking-A. Right to congregate. What'd he go yakking about this time?"
"I'm serious, watch this." Magnes walks over to look at the street curbs, it's not very hard to find a glass bottle laying around. "Are you watching?" he asks, waiting a moment, then suddenly he raises his hand and hurls the bottle at one of the men, he's not the best at throwing, but it's not hard to hit someone with a bottle.
The bottle does not pass through the first man, the closer. He does not expect such a rash movement from Magnes and he does not dodge. The glass shatters against his chest in a sharp corona. Blood swiftly follows, running down his neck as well as beneath his shirt, staining it dark indeed. "Oh-- oh. You--" But while the first is recovering, the second /darts/ forward, fists out and clenched. (In reality, the glass shatters harmlessly against the street, but there is no such image, no such sound. Only the wounded man and his wrathful companion.)
Whatever Rossi was expecting, it was not that. He watches Magnes's retrieval of the glass bottle with the periphery of his gaze, the bulk of his attention posed on the larger potential for trouble. Brain surgery can do that to a person's instincts. Misidentification. He curses "What the /fuck/ are you--" and moves, too late! too late! to grab that throwing arm. Potential energy is expended into illusory reality. One man recoils. Another moves. And the cop does what cops do: attempt to thwart Darwinism in action. "/Back off/," he snaps, whirling to grapple with the aggressor. "Back /OFF/."
"He's not really there!" Damnit, it's impossible to reason in this situation. His senses conflict, Magnes feels the glass shatter on the ground, but sees it smash against the man too. This is too confusing, are they mutants or illusions? He drops his backpack, grabbing the bottom end of his crutch. His leg still stings a bit, but it's definitely usable. "Damnit, just hurt one of them!" he exclaims toward Rossi, swinging the crutch at the top of the guy's head as hard as he possibly can, trying to make sure he doesn't accidentally go through the guy and hit Rossi, which is quite difficult.
The man is not interested in Rossi's attempt to avert Darwin, but Rossi is in his way. He turns his lunge into a tackle to the grapple, a grapple intended to bowl over Rossi with all due speed and push into Magnes. The stroke-down of the crutch just misses the man's wide scalp, but the impact of thug on cop has shoved Rossi into a rather less lucky position. The wounded man, in the meantime, is recovering. And coming forward.
Behind Rossi, Jason pins his nose between his thumb and forefinger and /sighs/.
Thus the thump of crutch as it grazes Rossi's head. An inch to the right and the still-healing scar of brain surgery would have received the blow. As it is, the cop staggers, his face whitening. "/Fuck/," gasps the baritone. There is a moment's dizzying whirl of bodies while balances sway and struggle, a teetering split-second when Rossi is not holding to restrain, but holding to support himself -- and then another spin. Habit and instinct divert momentum, sending both the detective and the man with him at an angle, just short of Magnes. One of them falls. The other stumbles, reaching out blindly to grab a car's hood. "You fucking /idiot/," Rossi rages.
Three guesses which one he is talking to.
"They're not fucking real! Just listen to me, shoot the guy, snap his neck, -anything-, he's not real!" A shoulder squirms, Magnes' eyes dart to the already wounded guy, then begins to walk over to attempt slamming the crutch at the guy's head repeatedly. For whatever strange reason this guy is both tangible and intangible, Magnes is determined to prove a point to Rossi. They're much different from Kitty, she couldn't interact with things while intangible, this is -weird-. "If you never trust anyone ever again in your entire life, trust me on this!" he pleads with Rossi one more time while swinging the crutch, the connection of the illusions haven't been made with Jason, it's just too freakin' strange and confusing to connect at all.
Whoomph, goes the grappler, momentarily out of breath. The wounded man, however, does not intend to go down, his face livid with constricted rage. He ducks Magnes's stroke with sudden and wrathful speed, and shoulders forward to /drop/ Magnes. And Jason, dancing backward from the fray with wide eyes (apparently), orchestrates. Magnes's feet lose all friction, as if he were standing on black ice rather than asphalt. And Magnes's head fills with a sudden, dizzied fugue as his inner ear gives out. You're going to fall, Magnes. /Fall/.
Rossi's phone leaps to hand far more readily than the gun, flipped open and already dialing with the press of a thumb. "10-13," he rasps into the device, his knuckles whitening as he straightens. The lean body sways, his face paling further. "10-13. Corner of--" The rest is a rattle of names and badge numbers, the response unheeded in favor of finding his feet again. "BACK OFF, YOU STUPID SON-OF-A-BITCH." /That/ is for Magnes. His body's exertion is for the wounded man, a stumbled step and painful recovery expended to grab at the bulldozing man's collar, perhaps a little late to prevent disaster for the younger man. Oh well. Such is life.
Magnes begins to wobble, knowing something is wrong, he -never- falls, "Shit, something is wrong, this isn't normal..." And suddenly, he slides on his side, things slowing and spinning, -very- disorienting. In the end, he ends up on his back. "Fuck, not again!" he exclaims, trying to get back up. "Rossi, just shoot them! I'm telling you, they're not really there!"
Rossi's grab misses wide (oh, the merits of being able to force the outcome) and the wounded man lands heavily atop Magnes and his weight is forbidding. Contrasting perceptions aside, Magnes will not be able to get up. It's a lot of weight, suffocating weight. Magnes can feel the constriction in his chest, the oxygen poor numbness hitting his limbs with the slow force of shock. And Jason orchestrates. The man's thick, bloodied fingers close around Magnes's neck, if they do not particularly add to the suffocation. The man is trying to get a grip before Rossi snags him. "That's what y'think, mutie? S'okay t'murder humans, huh? Crazy liddle bitch-boy." The other man has found his feet and is also closing in.
"Christ," rasps Rossi, and slaps down with to shove his arm behind the wounded man's and snake a half-nelson against the other man's neck. Muscles, weakened by illness but on their way to mending, strain and hold. "That's /enough/. Let go. /Let go/." Green eyes glare pure rage down at Magnes around the rumpled, sweating mess of assailant. Movement out of the corner of his eye kicks Chris's glance askance; he throws out an arm to point at his erstwhile wrestling partner. "Stay /put/."
Magnes is still disoriented, struggling to gain his breath even if Rossi manages to get the man up. "Fucking listen to me you jackass!" he strains to yell at Rossi through his suffocation. "Not, real, illusions, it's a, mutant power, I can..." but before he can finish, he can't get another breath out.
The wounded man, in all his heavy rage, is wearing down. As Rossi pulls hims back, he pulls back, breathing heavily-- and even his breath is soused. The other man, uncertain, stops, but it's a tense stop. Might strike at any moment if the copper tries to drag his buddy away. Jason? is a good, wary ten feet back. Violence. Aah.
Rossi eases up on his hold, but only slightly; his own breath is ragged, suddenly loud in the absence of violence. He drags the man back and away from Magnes, peeling themselves bodily from the suffocating boy. That his eyes burn is only to be expected. That his face remains an unhealthy white, gleaming with perspiration, is not. So much. In the near distance, sirens wail: for their own, the NYPD will /book/. "Stay down," he jags at Magnes, his attention watchful on the standing man nearby. The detective feels with his free hand behind his back, metal rattling as handcuffs are dragged out of his belt's sling.
Magnes strains, squirming on the ground and trying to get his breath back, he's still struggling to stand and groans as he begins to see colors.
The man watches his tight watch for another five seconds. And then he runs. The wounded man is still trying to catch his breath.
Rossi swears, but he does not pursue the other man; he is otherwise occupied with slapping cuffs on the bird in hand. The sirens split the air with a frenzied sharpness, turning the corner at speed. Brakes squeal. Uniforms bubble out to take over, even as two more cars spin down the street -- and the detective falls back, abruptly chalk-faced, relinquishing his collar to the assisting backup. "Him too," he tells a uniform, pointing somewhat blindly at Magnes. "Assault and battery, assault on an officer, and exercise of his right to remove himself from the gene pool in the middle of the fucking /Bronx/--"
And then the paramedics come, just in time to catch Rossi as he staggers, a hand reaching for the scar stamped in red, raw lines in his scalp. Party in the city. O la la!
[Log ends]
Cut tag notwithstanding, YES IT IS. Magnes goes to jail. And you just /knew/ Rossi would be the one to arrest him someday, didn't you? Yes you did.
"He's /what/?" John Beston's sharp question cuts over the background noise of the Homicide squad.
Ken Yamaguchi and Sal Tucci, busy tossing a baseball and speculation about a case across their desks, pause in mid-throw to stare at him.
"Three bucks says it's Gloria," says Sal.
"My money's on Chris," says Ken, who is a better gambler in that he almost always wins.
The remainder of John's conversation is lost in a quieter mutter that defies the pair's unabashed attempts to listen in. When the phone clatters in the receiver, John discovers them flanking him like a pair of diabolical, slightly grubby bookends.
He knows better than to bother with argument. "Chris," he says, swiping his coat off the back of his chair. "Bronx. Blow to the head. Doc's checking him out."
"We'll come," Sal decides, stretching with a long arm to snag his own jacket off the rack.
It is Ken who poses the baffled question uppermost in all three minds. "What the hell," he says. "Didn't we send him out to buy /donuts/?"
=NYC= The Bronx
The Bronx has its upscale and its downscale, but the downscale is better known. Once, half of South Bronx burned to the ground in a series of deliberate arsons. If it's since rebuilt, The Bronx's reputation has hardly improved and tourists are comparitively few and wary -- despite the Bronx Zoo and Yankee Stadium. And South Bronx residents can tend toward the high octane, not malicious, but certainly energetic. Even trains have been lettered with elaborate graffiti, hip-hop and rap blare merrily into the streets, and The Bronx Cheer is very well slang for blowing a raspberry.
[This room is set watchable. Use alias TheBronx to watch here.]
"What do you think I am? Some kind of evil mastermind with power stealing abilities who plans to drug you with pizza and pluck out your brain?" Magnes hints, he hints -hard-, and really hopes this guy doesn't watch much TV.
What does Jason think Rossi is? The cop stalks down the street, his hands in his pockets, his shorn head bared to the breeze. Even when he ambles, he gives off the slightly aggressive quality of a hound on some scent. The green eyes are blank, seeing far and not seeing at all. Thought. He is deep in thought. Also, walking. Complex combination.
"If you were, it wouldn't be smart to tell me so." Jason now looks-- opposite the opposite. "But this sudden friendliness does not really excite my trust." And in looking opposite, the cop, that familiar angular outline, catches his attention. Oh.
Magnes feels a new body getting near, looking back with familiarity himself, then quickly darting his eyes to Jason and whispering. "Be cautious around this guy, he works in mutant affairs." he warns, not exactly trusting Rossi or his profession all that much.
News bulletin for Jason. Rossi veers around a moving body, attentive at least to motion, and finds himself caught by moving body's leash, which is attached to moving body's chihuahua. The two extricate each other, with much excitement from the animal, and there is new attention in the pale gaze that sweeps the street, absently marking other hazards. Like -- Magnes. Oh. The cop stops and simply looks at that young man, his eyebrows lowering over blankness. "You," he says, and then adds, resigned, "Fuck-a-duck. What did I do now?"
"Oh, gee. That's terrifying," Jason drawls through his teeth and unfolds his arms to slip his hands in his pocket. It is Rossi he watches, if he says nothing else.
The black brows crease around a furrow. "I don't," he says briefly. "I don't have pets. Got enough problems with the people. Question wasn't for you. Who's your friend?" he asks, with a quizzical glance at Jason. The detective nods to the apparent Asian, his face reserved. The bleakness of past illness still haunts his face, digging shadows around his eyes and cheekbones. And then there is his haircut -- but it's cool. It's all cool. "Rossi," he directs towards the new face. "Chris Rossi."
"Askatzik Chong," Jason identifies himself without emotion. "That's me. And I'm not here to cause trouble" is said with that same emotionless drawl, only the merest bit bleak as if to match Rossi's-- afflictions.
Magnes raises an eyebrow at Jason's first name, but just shakes it off. "We just met, I believe we were about to go have pizza, would you like to join us, Mr. Rossi?" he offers while blinking innocently a few times, giving his most naive looking smile, even throwing in a head tilt.
"Askatzik," Rossi repeats, zipping the name off with the New Yorker's panache: a lifetime of introductions involving complicated, esoteric names. He settles his weight on his heels, his arms akimbo, and arches his brow at Magnes with the baffled quality of one encountering a threadbare carnival exhibit marketed as new. "You just met and you're going to go have pizza? It turn out you were long-lost brothers or something? --Relax," he adds towards Jason, grimacing. "I'm not looking for a collar. He tell you I was a cop? Or just that I was a dick?"
"I haven't the faintest why he wants to go out with me. It happens with distressing frequence. A man steps out for a smoke, a man is accosted by some good-natured kook who wants to buy him pizza," and the bleakness is shed like a second skin. Jason is acting. "It does make a man suspect a sting operation. Pull the homeless off the street before they can pull property values down. And I'm not even homeless."
"I'm straight!" Magnes quickly defends after Jason mentions 'going out' with him, of course he takes it the wrong way and is always quickly defensive. "I just figured I'd share a pizza with a guy who helped me out a bit. And I think sting operations are usually done when there's a whole group of people getting..." he stops to search for a word, finally deciding on, "Stung."
Rossi's jaw stretches itself long, his mouth crimping into a cramped little grimace. He massages the hollowed cheeks with a hand, palm sliding across the rasp of bristle on the shadow-touched face. "Too many Midwesterners in town. --Not that friendly's not a bad thing," he says patiently, for Magnes's benefit, "but New Yorkers, man, they don't tend to like it when you get all up in their face with the 'be my bud' shit. It's a big city with a lot of people. You never heard the phrase 'good fences make good neighbors?'"
"I helped him out not a bit, which leads me to suspect that he either is both gay and desperate, or after something. I suppose," and Jason turns his face back toward Magnes, the suspicion all alight again, "that those two options are more or less the same thing."
"So far I've met three extremely bitchy females, you don't have to remind me of the New Yorker thing." Magnes frowns quickly at Jason, defending again, "I am not gay! Stop saying that. I think breasts are quite nice." Not that he's ever seen real ones.
Despite himself, the corner of Rossi's mouth slants up. Most of the expression is lost behind his paused hand. "In one direction," he tells 'Chong' with deadpan cynicism. "Not in the other. He can be after something and not be gay or desperate. --Fuck, kid, if three bitchy chicks in all this time is what you've met, you've got off lucky." He shifts his weight again, shoving his hand back into his pocket. The cheap suit jacket, pushed back by his arm, bares the leather holster and the gleam of his badge on his belt. "You got a knack for getting into stuff."
"Many gay men find breasts quite nice. Aesthetic. Circles." Jason, ah, draws a circle with his pinky. But he is again watching Rossi.
"Geometric," Rossi tacks on. Pose order, what? He grins briefly, suddenly, white teeth flashing with the green of black-spliced eyes.
"I like breasts for more straight guy reasons. I remember my first boob, it was so squishy and um, rubbery." Magnes is lying quite badly, but he must protect his sexuality! "I don't really like, get into stuff. The um, Mr. M things..." he censors for Jason's benefit. "Were all coincidences I'm pretty sure, and I wouldn't have gotten stabbed if that illusion guy wasn't there, talk about cheating."
"Mr. M. Again. I haven't the faintest what you are talking about." Jason's voice is cool, detatched, and his mind veers elsewhere. In the road behind, two large men emerge from the shadows, indistinct with distance, but approaching.
"Stabbed," Rossi says with lazy interest. His eyes hood themselves, an expression of deceptive drowsiness concealing the sharpness of their focus. "Illusion guy. Right. Because you could've taken him if it weren't for his spooky powers."
"It was his friend, he didn't do anything but hold me with them. I couldn't have taken his friend, but I could have dodged and not ended up on the ground." Magnes' eye twitches, realizing this is the first time he actually mentioned what really happened, to Rossi at least. "Don't worry about it, this isn't proper conversation in public." he says with a shrug, quoting directly from Trevor.
"No, it isn't," Jason says with that same apparent cool detachment as the men move in, more distinguishable in the half-light of the streetlamps now. They are massive indeed, unsubtle, but their manner, for now, more loitering than aggressive.
Green eyes flick a glance towards them, professionally assessing, before refocusing on Jason and Magnes. "'Don't worry about it,'" Rossi mocks, the rapid-fire pace of the Brooklyn accent ameliorated by the stretch of a drawl. He runs a hand over his head, raking his fingers through long hair that -- is no longer there. The shorter bristle rasps quietly, and prompts another grimace. "Hey, don't mention it. Not like what happens in mutant-land has anything to do with rule of law." He is only a little bit sarcastic. And the Atlantic is only a little bit wet.
Magnes squirms his shoulders, though this time it's more because his backpack is very heavy and he's been standing for a while. "Well what happens to me is my own business if I decide. No one can arrest her if I don't press charges, and I don't have intentions in doing so." He lets a 'her' slip, but he doesn't notice. "So stop doing your whole cop thing with me, I know the law."
And the two men shuffle a final few steps forward, almost in tandem. One voice projects low and dark-rough toward the crowd of three. "Kid. With the specs. We wanna talk to you." Jason's eyes turn all dark and mild on Magnes.
"No," Rossi says mildly. "You don't, jackass. Stabbing's a state charge, and keeping her identity to yourself's obstruction. She didn't accidentally drop a dog on your car and dent your hood." His gaze slews towards the two men, his eyebrows lowering in a renewed appraisal of the two. He redistributes his weight from one leg to both, his hand shoving idly back into his pockets. That the coat is thus pushed back to reveal his badge again is -- accidental. Maybe.
Magnes tilts his head, very uneasy, but remembers what Jean told him. Intangible mutants, just like Kitty, right? "Um, no thank you..." he declines, beginning to back up and whisper to Rossi, in this case he -does- trust the cop. "Dude, they're intangible, I think they're mutants or something, but you could walk right through them." he tries to make sure Jason can't hear, getting quite defensive as he peers at the two men, even going so far as to close his eyes from the uneasiness.
"Lookit," the second man gruffs out in a laugh. "He's cozyin' up to the cop." "Betcher the cop's a mutant, too," returns the first and steps another step forward. "It's cute. Liddle kid," is crooned most specifically at Magnes. "We jus' wants t'talk 'bout yer flappin' big lips is all." Jason in his shell subtly slips behind Rossi. Just trying to be inobtrusive.
Which puts Rossi at front and gives Jason, at least, a splendid view of the surgical scar that still shows dull red under the hair. "Mutant my ass," says the detective, slouching. Another deception: the lean body tightens under the loose jacket, weight sinking into the balls of feet for a quick answer, as needed. "You never heard of the NYPD's hiring policy? --It's a free sidewalk. US-fucking-A. Right to congregate. What'd he go yakking about this time?"
"I'm serious, watch this." Magnes walks over to look at the street curbs, it's not very hard to find a glass bottle laying around. "Are you watching?" he asks, waiting a moment, then suddenly he raises his hand and hurls the bottle at one of the men, he's not the best at throwing, but it's not hard to hit someone with a bottle.
The bottle does not pass through the first man, the closer. He does not expect such a rash movement from Magnes and he does not dodge. The glass shatters against his chest in a sharp corona. Blood swiftly follows, running down his neck as well as beneath his shirt, staining it dark indeed. "Oh-- oh. You--" But while the first is recovering, the second /darts/ forward, fists out and clenched. (In reality, the glass shatters harmlessly against the street, but there is no such image, no such sound. Only the wounded man and his wrathful companion.)
Whatever Rossi was expecting, it was not that. He watches Magnes's retrieval of the glass bottle with the periphery of his gaze, the bulk of his attention posed on the larger potential for trouble. Brain surgery can do that to a person's instincts. Misidentification. He curses "What the /fuck/ are you--" and moves, too late! too late! to grab that throwing arm. Potential energy is expended into illusory reality. One man recoils. Another moves. And the cop does what cops do: attempt to thwart Darwinism in action. "/Back off/," he snaps, whirling to grapple with the aggressor. "Back /OFF/."
"He's not really there!" Damnit, it's impossible to reason in this situation. His senses conflict, Magnes feels the glass shatter on the ground, but sees it smash against the man too. This is too confusing, are they mutants or illusions? He drops his backpack, grabbing the bottom end of his crutch. His leg still stings a bit, but it's definitely usable. "Damnit, just hurt one of them!" he exclaims toward Rossi, swinging the crutch at the top of the guy's head as hard as he possibly can, trying to make sure he doesn't accidentally go through the guy and hit Rossi, which is quite difficult.
The man is not interested in Rossi's attempt to avert Darwin, but Rossi is in his way. He turns his lunge into a tackle to the grapple, a grapple intended to bowl over Rossi with all due speed and push into Magnes. The stroke-down of the crutch just misses the man's wide scalp, but the impact of thug on cop has shoved Rossi into a rather less lucky position. The wounded man, in the meantime, is recovering. And coming forward.
Behind Rossi, Jason pins his nose between his thumb and forefinger and /sighs/.
Thus the thump of crutch as it grazes Rossi's head. An inch to the right and the still-healing scar of brain surgery would have received the blow. As it is, the cop staggers, his face whitening. "/Fuck/," gasps the baritone. There is a moment's dizzying whirl of bodies while balances sway and struggle, a teetering split-second when Rossi is not holding to restrain, but holding to support himself -- and then another spin. Habit and instinct divert momentum, sending both the detective and the man with him at an angle, just short of Magnes. One of them falls. The other stumbles, reaching out blindly to grab a car's hood. "You fucking /idiot/," Rossi rages.
Three guesses which one he is talking to.
"They're not fucking real! Just listen to me, shoot the guy, snap his neck, -anything-, he's not real!" A shoulder squirms, Magnes' eyes dart to the already wounded guy, then begins to walk over to attempt slamming the crutch at the guy's head repeatedly. For whatever strange reason this guy is both tangible and intangible, Magnes is determined to prove a point to Rossi. They're much different from Kitty, she couldn't interact with things while intangible, this is -weird-. "If you never trust anyone ever again in your entire life, trust me on this!" he pleads with Rossi one more time while swinging the crutch, the connection of the illusions haven't been made with Jason, it's just too freakin' strange and confusing to connect at all.
Whoomph, goes the grappler, momentarily out of breath. The wounded man, however, does not intend to go down, his face livid with constricted rage. He ducks Magnes's stroke with sudden and wrathful speed, and shoulders forward to /drop/ Magnes. And Jason, dancing backward from the fray with wide eyes (apparently), orchestrates. Magnes's feet lose all friction, as if he were standing on black ice rather than asphalt. And Magnes's head fills with a sudden, dizzied fugue as his inner ear gives out. You're going to fall, Magnes. /Fall/.
Rossi's phone leaps to hand far more readily than the gun, flipped open and already dialing with the press of a thumb. "10-13," he rasps into the device, his knuckles whitening as he straightens. The lean body sways, his face paling further. "10-13. Corner of--" The rest is a rattle of names and badge numbers, the response unheeded in favor of finding his feet again. "BACK OFF, YOU STUPID SON-OF-A-BITCH." /That/ is for Magnes. His body's exertion is for the wounded man, a stumbled step and painful recovery expended to grab at the bulldozing man's collar, perhaps a little late to prevent disaster for the younger man. Oh well. Such is life.
Magnes begins to wobble, knowing something is wrong, he -never- falls, "Shit, something is wrong, this isn't normal..." And suddenly, he slides on his side, things slowing and spinning, -very- disorienting. In the end, he ends up on his back. "Fuck, not again!" he exclaims, trying to get back up. "Rossi, just shoot them! I'm telling you, they're not really there!"
Rossi's grab misses wide (oh, the merits of being able to force the outcome) and the wounded man lands heavily atop Magnes and his weight is forbidding. Contrasting perceptions aside, Magnes will not be able to get up. It's a lot of weight, suffocating weight. Magnes can feel the constriction in his chest, the oxygen poor numbness hitting his limbs with the slow force of shock. And Jason orchestrates. The man's thick, bloodied fingers close around Magnes's neck, if they do not particularly add to the suffocation. The man is trying to get a grip before Rossi snags him. "That's what y'think, mutie? S'okay t'murder humans, huh? Crazy liddle bitch-boy." The other man has found his feet and is also closing in.
"Christ," rasps Rossi, and slaps down with to shove his arm behind the wounded man's and snake a half-nelson against the other man's neck. Muscles, weakened by illness but on their way to mending, strain and hold. "That's /enough/. Let go. /Let go/." Green eyes glare pure rage down at Magnes around the rumpled, sweating mess of assailant. Movement out of the corner of his eye kicks Chris's glance askance; he throws out an arm to point at his erstwhile wrestling partner. "Stay /put/."
Magnes is still disoriented, struggling to gain his breath even if Rossi manages to get the man up. "Fucking listen to me you jackass!" he strains to yell at Rossi through his suffocation. "Not, real, illusions, it's a, mutant power, I can..." but before he can finish, he can't get another breath out.
The wounded man, in all his heavy rage, is wearing down. As Rossi pulls hims back, he pulls back, breathing heavily-- and even his breath is soused. The other man, uncertain, stops, but it's a tense stop. Might strike at any moment if the copper tries to drag his buddy away. Jason? is a good, wary ten feet back. Violence. Aah.
Rossi eases up on his hold, but only slightly; his own breath is ragged, suddenly loud in the absence of violence. He drags the man back and away from Magnes, peeling themselves bodily from the suffocating boy. That his eyes burn is only to be expected. That his face remains an unhealthy white, gleaming with perspiration, is not. So much. In the near distance, sirens wail: for their own, the NYPD will /book/. "Stay down," he jags at Magnes, his attention watchful on the standing man nearby. The detective feels with his free hand behind his back, metal rattling as handcuffs are dragged out of his belt's sling.
Magnes strains, squirming on the ground and trying to get his breath back, he's still struggling to stand and groans as he begins to see colors.
The man watches his tight watch for another five seconds. And then he runs. The wounded man is still trying to catch his breath.
Rossi swears, but he does not pursue the other man; he is otherwise occupied with slapping cuffs on the bird in hand. The sirens split the air with a frenzied sharpness, turning the corner at speed. Brakes squeal. Uniforms bubble out to take over, even as two more cars spin down the street -- and the detective falls back, abruptly chalk-faced, relinquishing his collar to the assisting backup. "Him too," he tells a uniform, pointing somewhat blindly at Magnes. "Assault and battery, assault on an officer, and exercise of his right to remove himself from the gene pool in the middle of the fucking /Bronx/--"
And then the paramedics come, just in time to catch Rossi as he staggers, a hand reaching for the scar stamped in red, raw lines in his scalp. Party in the city. O la la!
[Log ends]
Cut tag notwithstanding, YES IT IS. Magnes goes to jail. And you just /knew/ Rossi would be the one to arrest him someday, didn't you? Yes you did.
"He's /what/?" John Beston's sharp question cuts over the background noise of the Homicide squad.
Ken Yamaguchi and Sal Tucci, busy tossing a baseball and speculation about a case across their desks, pause in mid-throw to stare at him.
"Three bucks says it's Gloria," says Sal.
"My money's on Chris," says Ken, who is a better gambler in that he almost always wins.
The remainder of John's conversation is lost in a quieter mutter that defies the pair's unabashed attempts to listen in. When the phone clatters in the receiver, John discovers them flanking him like a pair of diabolical, slightly grubby bookends.
He knows better than to bother with argument. "Chris," he says, swiping his coat off the back of his chair. "Bronx. Blow to the head. Doc's checking him out."
"We'll come," Sal decides, stretching with a long arm to snag his own jacket off the rack.
It is Ken who poses the baffled question uppermost in all three minds. "What the hell," he says. "Didn't we send him out to buy /donuts/?"