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rupert "miles" glass ([info]clowning) wrote in [info]bellumlogs,
@ 2010-06-16 13:42:00

Previous Entry  Add to memories!  Tell a Friend!  Next Entry
Entry tags:black forest witch, rumplestiltskin

who: miles and OPEN.
what: dreaming, and then exploring.
where: the apartment complex, specifically... that damned elevator that never quite goes to where it's supposed to!
when: late evening.
warnings: probably unnecessary.


It was much in the style of a lions growl having lazily secreted itself in between blades of sallow grass through the savanna floor; although the lightning was cast the thunder was invisible, and therefore could go unnoticed. Most unfortunate. A gallop of it rumbled and trumpeted against the neck of a smooth, dark sky. A snake in a pile of hoses to those who raised their noses. Miles was dreaming of the day he was born. When the sky decided to say hello, and the stars spilled their cups.


The dream shifted, as dreams often do, to another location entirely.

People, as they frantically weaved their ways this way and that through the maze of boxed, evening market streets, did not bother to watch out overhead for the inevitable whip crack line of white lightning. As it streaked its naked slenderness through the clouds, Miles noticed his vision was actually... much lower than usual. He was not standing the sturdy six feet he usually did. Odd. Was he a child in this dream? And where was he? He was thirsty. Maybe this dream had diet coke.

The cobblestone streets were lined with those attempting to sell this mornings bread, this mornings cake, this mornings fruit -- this mornings anything before calling it a night. Drunkards were already swerving out of taverns for a snack, singing songs about the revolution. Singing about the King getting married.

And Miles, although he felt the phantom vibration of the thunder rattling at the bottom of his ribcage, was just like the others. Not paying any attention; his brow was dotted with sequins of sweat, and his eyes narrowed in a secluded brand of determination. What puffy clouds there were, he'd noticed, blocked out the laughter of twinkling stars, and seemed as black seeds in the teeth of a Heaven that didn't exist.

The illumination of lightning once again, as he raised his chin to search for stars, flashed and fled as quickly as it had arrived. A mugshot for Zeus to remember him by. Immortalizing the curious and reverent look on his face, that in that fleeting moment was highlighted almost to a bony reflection of death's iniquity... it was not his face in his mind's eye.

And he awoke with a jolt.

Miles half expected rain with how the smell of the air he took in had an almost refreshing odor, and half yearned for it. The dream had left him longing, as most dreams are wont to do, and of course, curious. His past was a distance memory when awake, and the ghosts there haunting the hallways of his wrathful psyche usually summoned up images of rain. Some of the memories of the circus were pleasurable. Some were painful. Some he wanted to never forget, and some he hoped that one day he would lose with the withering affect that the mind has on remembrance.

Tossing the blankets off of him hurriedly and irate, the way one might if they detected the approach of a spider too small to cause alarm, he ejected himself from bed and was happy that his mind was not bent on being rewound. Instantly, the haze of not having slept quite enough eased and erased the impression of the dream--rubbing his eyes of course helped--helped to rid his confusion, and helped to make his vision even blurrier. He liked to have blurry vision. Seeing clearly was much overrated.

After gathering up his clothes, getting dressed, not checking the time, having a diet coke, and tying up his long hair into a pony tail to which he'd amended the look of with a fedora and feather, he'd decided to investigate the apartment complex further. His associates were likely running errands for him at this hour in some dark corner of the city, of which he'd throw light onto soon. There was no use dilly-dallying for long, since there was much business to attend to tonight. For now, he just wanted to see if the rest of the complex looked the way his did, or if there were better locations to aspire to once he stole that wondrous thing he had his eye on at the jeweler ...

As he entered the elevator, he pressed the button for the 4th floor. The elevator, having a familiarly musty smell, had a minor reflective surface which he was more interested in than the mirror itself, and he was able to see himself partly burnished within the golden trim of it. And having still been half awake, he'd reached for the effaced reflections cheek, elongated as it was and would be in a fun house, as if lifes bones were as misaligned and fattened as the false projection implied.

DING.

And he set out onto the... what floor is this? This isn't the 4th floor. Before he was able to turn around, the elevator had come to a close.



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[info]shebringscurses
2010-06-17 10:03 pm UTC (link)
Silly boy, Bellum was no place for sleeping! Everyone knew that dreams always got the best of you here. They set loose flocks of razor winged butterflies in the pit of your stomach, and made dry men beg for a bottle or a knife. Even the best sleeps teetered precariously on the cliff of nightmares, although it was nightmares that brought you the greatest sense of relief upon waking.. so maybe they were to be held the closest to your chest. One should hope for a nightmare before they laid their head down.

That was Vaughn's manifesto, but she had not been sleeping much lately. She was not herself these days. She was trying to be Jane, and it was making things complicated. She did not know who Jane was, or what Jane did, or what Jane would say.. so Vaughn took it upon herself to make a new Jane. A better Jane, one she could really wrap her head around.

New Jane was about late nights and city streets. Screaming in an empty alley just to hear it echo all the way up to where the bricked rooftops rubbed elbows with the moon. New Jane liked the park, and she liked to be barefoot, but she missed the winter. She could remember a cold that was so deep it went through one's bones, it was a cold that pervaded everything, it took one over, and it was the only thing one could think about. Only how cold it was.. and not the fact that.. she was losing a grip on everything. She was Vaughn, not Jane. She was Vaughn, she was just pretending.. she was supposed to be doing something important.

Vaughn hadn't tried to contact Daniel, she'd barely made him suffer yet. Because that was what she was here for, that's why Jane was back.. to make him suffer. She'd fallen away from that intention sometime between tonight and two weeks ago.. it just became easier to wander the city, to come home while the last of the darkness was leaking away. And then she made some tea, and she smoked at her window, and she thought of the Witch.

What would the Witch do? The Witch would go up to R1, right now, she'd scale the stairs and she'd make that man sorry. After putting out her cigarette, and adopting a methodical, mechanical pace.. she exited her fourth floor apartment, and took to the stairs. Up, and up, and up. Her feet were bare, and she wore a trio of silk slips that barely functioned as casual dress. Layers of silk and lace in odd, alternating colors; magenta and seagreen with an overlay of threadbare black.

Vaughn could remember a time when she'd spend her nights in the stairwell, exhaling smokestacks and watching the strangers. But that had been quite a long time ago, when she'd still been able to be herself here. Before certain misunderstandings.. like the knife, or pushing Boyd down the stairs, or when Sleeping Beauty turned up with all those peony bruises. But really, who was counting?

It was while she was crossing the landing of the eighth floor that the elevator sounded, and perturbed by the invasion of her solitude, Vaughn came to an abrupt halt. The man was no one she had seen before, although she had to admit that she'd hardly been keeping tabs on the new residents these days. It was a touch difficult when one could not even keep track of themselves.

Stepping forward onto the rustic bristle of carpeting, and leaning somewhat against the stairwell's ominous mouth, she surveyed him before speaking. "You look lost.."

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[info]clowning
2010-06-18 06:21 am UTC (link)
"I do," he'd drawled half-heartedly into the voices direction. Though it seemed as if he was otherwise paying no mind to her (more so, it might have seemed he was paying attention mostly to what surrounded him), the very faint movement of his chin into her direction would indicate that, although subtly, he was indeed paying attention to her multi-colored slips, long legs, and dark hair. Oh, and no shoes. Apparently, this must be her floor, or one she's acquainted with. One only walks bare footed where they are comfortable. A magician always inspects minor and major details, to pluck out what is useful and to disqualify the useless. A magician analyzes them within miniature instances most others would use for admiring the lighting. Not the case for our 'lost', or perhaps more accurately misplaced one.

However, an adventurous and fascinated region of his psyche was all too focused on the unique differences of his new surroundings. The other portion, of course, was occupied with those words, where they'd continued to ricochet despite him having bitten their bullet. You look lost. Was he lost? He'd turned around gracefully, his brow furrowed into one smooth node of which no delicate thumb of a future princess could iron out with loves impression, and he stood up straight and tall. It was rude of him not to address her directly and immediately, to be preoccupied with studying the floor he'd known existed, but had failed as of yet to explore. Very rude! But did he care? Not particularly. It would be nice of him to pretend he did, though. And thus, he'd moistened the corner of his mouth with a swift dart of his tongue, and arched his brow.

"I suppose I am. That elevator," he'd motioned to the closed, temperamental box with a gloved hand, "Brought me to the wrong floor. And here I am. A pioneer in a territory unknown to me; a stranger in a strange land... here with a stranger, saying I look lost." Miles grinned then. He grinned in such a luminous and genuine way, that it could either peel the stockings off of the devil's spies, or rival the moon. It's nature was arguable. Entirely subjective.

With the strong voice and sturdy confidence of a performer (hint, hint.), he'd announced: "My name's Miles. Miles Glass." and took a deep and respectful bow. "And you are...?"

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[info]shebringscurses
2010-06-19 05:57 am UTC (link)
Gloves. How unusual. Vaughn tightened the autumnal mulch of her borrowed eyes on him, collecting details from his toes to the tiptop of his hat's avian embellishment. Meticulously dragging the facts beneath her vultured wings for devouring later; he was roaming the halls, and it was quite late, he seemed confused, or just distracted.

The woman did not seem to mind that the epicenter of his focus was reigned on the hall itself and not her. Vaughn quite preferred to go unnoticed, to be of no concern, to slip between the cracks and carry on with her study. She seemed to be intently staring at his knees when the man turned to speak, and her attention was slow in rising. Notably undisturbed by the awareness that most people did not enjoy being so obviously contemplated, she made no expression to hide it. The chocolate script of an eyebrow hiked, almost patronizing in it's bemusement when he mentioned the elevator. Had nobody told this poor, new soul that the evil steel box could not be trusted? How rude of them!

She was attentive when he spoke, pale mouth curling into a slyfox smile. Such words! They danced like smoke & mirrors, and it was quite captivating, although a tad too unusual to be devious. He reminded her of a ringmaster more than a con artist, and Vaughn straightened from her slouched curl against the stairwell's entryway. "Jane.. they call me Jane."

She even had the gall to pluck the laced hem of her slip's skirt with two scissored fingers in a mild, but surprisingly unmocking, kind of curtsy.

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[info]clowning
2010-06-19 07:16 pm UTC (link)
For however faint, a curtsey--how quaint. An anachronism that could have intrigued him, if not for his concentration faithfully continuing to be broken by any subtly shattering creak, lightly misty dripdrop, murmuring stir of echoes, ghostly movement, or a reposing adjustment of the old building itself.

He'd likely just pressed the wrong button. Case closed.

"Jane. What an awful name for someone so very far from plain." Straightening himself out, smoothing his garments down, and seeing to it his long black hair was still up, he was ready in every direction. He had as well cunningly stolen a glance over to the naive elevator with only his inquisitive eyes, as if the thing, like a pixie in a fairy tale, might not be there any longer having been found out with its trickery. Fortunately, when he'd looked, it was still there. Which meant that he would eventually be able to either get lost again, or make some money tonight. Preferably the latter. It would be quite obvious to Jane and well, pretty much anyone what Miles' profession was--indeed, if they knew anything about magicians--the hat, the gloves, the suit, even the shoes--were all tell tale. And thus, he took no steps forward with his body, but did seem to advance nearer with eyes only.

"Is this your floor, Jane? Or have you just been dropped off here the same as I have?" he'd inquired, the eye, beneath the arched bridging of his brow, had narrowed, as if within this dim lighting, the act would indeed make it more easy to see her. "By chance and not by choice?"

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[info]shebringscurses
2010-06-20 09:01 pm UTC (link)
Vaughn had very little familiarity with magicians. The details of Miles' attire were attributed to eccentricity rather than profession, which was probably safer. You couldn't trust a magician. Or a witch, for that matter.

When he banished her alias as something not worth her degree of elaborateness, Vaughn's smile was predatory. "You're sweet," although the words managed to not sound like much of a compliment. Sweetness was not something to be admired in these parts, it got you eaten alive by the banshees and beasties that roamed the halls on nights just like this.

"I must say that I'm curious if your name suits you at all, Mr Glass." The admission arrived with the cool tilt of her smile, as if coy was ever a possibility. She straightened her silken posture and brought up the deceptively delicate frame of her shoulders, pinning him under the weight of her attention. "Do you break under pressure?" Eyebrows slid into sharp arches, but her expression spoke of amusement more than seriousness. Would he need to be wrapped in paper for safe transport back to his own floor?

Speaking of floors, her poison honey eyes slid down the empty hallway when he mentioned it. "I have never lived on this floor." She examined one of the door numbers, confirming that they were indeed on the eighth. "I believe it's reserved for superstitious school teachers."

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[info]clowning
2010-06-21 03:34 am UTC (link)
"If I would have been capable of breaking under pressure, Jane, you would be conversing with my pieces."

Making an improvement of his posture, even if that were hardly necessary, the small, inky pools of his pupils swelled and fluctuated; suddenly smitten with an idea. He'd had a thought then that she was some kind of pretty ghost that haunted these hallways, causing the elevators to misfire, and an appealing game to play would be to ask her many questions that he would not usually ask so openly, or boldly. Not that he lacked any kind of boldness. Indeed, he was more forthright than many. It was just that in his idle time, tonight especially, he had felt as if his surroundings were becoming more and more of a prisonic entrapment. And games, oh, with people... those were the highlight of his nights... perhaps a lie, or two, will do ... ah, she wasn't a ghost, this he knew. However, wouldn't it be clever to go a'hunting? Yes, you should lie. It's not so far-fetched!

"As it is you're meeting me in tact. You've also come at an integral time." his chin took an angle of integrity, a tilt at a left incline that seemed, in the sallow and dim light, to distinguish a knowledgeable chisel in his cheekbones. He might have been a well-learned man. A scholar. A fool. An anything. The confidence of course, with which he projected, was ever a quality naturally built in in all human beings--it was just that Miles was accustomed to summoning it.

He'd perched the knuckles of one of his hands against his hip and studied her. Mysterious things always appealed to him more so than tedious, regular ones, and she was being mysterious. She had omitted as much detail as someone cunning would. She was a kitsune in a court of rowdy emperors. One of the kharites that hides out in Eros' bedroom to avoid Zeus. It was more fun creating stories for her than knowing her truth! And he took a few steps into her direction before halting again and explaining himself more fully.

"I was just considering the existence of ghosts. I do not believe in them as much as say, superstitious school teachers might, but life on my floor is uncreative, tedious, and terrible. I pleaded to ennui to find me something with which to amuse myself. Lo' and behold... I've arrived on the wrong floor. A coincidence. What is it that made you wander the halls" he glanced down at her naked feet. "Boredom?"

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[info]shebringscurses
2010-06-22 04:44 am UTC (link)
Kitsune? Wrong, sir. She is just a woman behind glass, impossible to reach or even hear properly, there are layers of reality(or maybe just sanity) between them. She is pretty, in a basic way.. but if one were to squint just right, they'd catch the truth in her. A half woman, half demon kind of Kali, ripping the very bolts of this building loose with her teeth because nothing ever looked so lovely around her bare feet as rubble. This is the decimation period, welcome.

"I've heard there are ghosts in this building," she commends him on his curiosity with a bit of truth. There had never been ghosts for her, Vaughn had never killed anyone -- difficult as that may be to believe -- she'd never been haunted by loved ones. Loved ones, what were those? She'd discovered the freshly dead, in this very building, but they did not haunt her.

"And there is no coincidence in this building," she dropped her voice with the undertow of a watery smile. Trade secret, Mr. Glass.

Reaching into the underwired cup of her slip's bra, she extracted a pack of light cigarettes. The white and gold coffin tilted, and the lid spilled open on command before she pried one and it's lighter companion loose. "Me?" Amused by his redirection, the woman shrugged before settling a pale nail onto her mouth, eying him above the flame that rose from it's metal wheel as she sucked down smoke. Even if smoking in the hall was surely contradictory to lease agreements.

"I was just on my way to murder a man in his bed," her tone is light, and it's all too possible(& hopeful) that she's joking. "So it looks like you're the hero of distraction today, Mr. Glass."

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[info]clowning
2010-06-22 05:09 am UTC (link)
Ah, women behind glass. Polished nicely. Free of Dust. Begging to be touched. Showcased. Bejeweled, abandoned, and eventually ignored for a reason ...

This Jane had "trouble" written all over her. The writing wasn't at all nasty and in no way did it lack a fine art, no, it was inscribed, much like a delicate calligraphy on creamy parchment, and had the charm of a sheet swindled out of the Marquis De Sade's boudoir. It was not dirtily pinched as with a fountain pen. It was bold and red as blood on snow. And ah, how he'd grinned when she'd mentioned murder. In the many jurisdictions of his multi-faceted psyche, a few could appreciate not only a good joke simultaneously, but of course a decent serving of honestly. He'd cognitively lapped up that juicy detail like a kitten would whole milk, and fortified his smile farther--with a laugh. It was a delightful laugh. A laugh that crudely and carelessly flooded the halls with a sort of intoxicating clamber. When he laughed, it was if one were zeroing in on the secret laughter of a primordial God revisiting nature--it was unchained yet not untethered, and somewhat made the listener uncomfortable, as if they'd accidentally seen too much, of something not to be exposed so readily.

"Murder?" he'd managed. "Murder a man in his sleep! Really. You? Jane? Jane with the cigarettes that I didn't know we were allowed to smoke in the hallways..." he'd added, feeling around for his own but ah, that was a ghostly sort of instinct, considering he'd quit long ago. Hmph. "Jane who walks barefoot and doesn't believe in coincidence. I think you should do it. Especially if he deserves it..."

... and then, some very deep recess of himself, a neighborhood very, very obscure and barely there, flashed a light upon itself. A particle entering a blackhole will for an instance ionize itself and produce light; it was much like that. Yes, and an instinct to offer help was a temptation he yielded to entertaining ... perhaps for a price.

No, no. What are you thinking?

"...May I ask why it is you want this person dead? Or was that a joke?"

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[info]shebringscurses
2010-06-22 05:28 am UTC (link)
If he deserved it? Oh, her laugh was rich as poison honey, thick as the ivy that scaled the Tower of London. She was indebted to him for making her laugh, because nobody ever dare tried, and therefore crept closer on bare, black painted toes. Catching the signal of his hands seeking out empty(or perhaps just empty of cigarettes) pockets, she extended her pack of American lights to him. More of a blood offering than one of peace, she had no quarrel with this man.

"A joke.." She answered with an easy smile, one that said she was questionably flattered he would think he capable of such a trying act as murder. She almost admitted it, very nearly.. but there was no doubt that this man was too new for the truth. Look at him, his blood was fresh and his limbs were without wither. He had spirit in him still, and was not ghosting around every corner. He was still young, he'd yet to take on the corpseland wax that the rest of the residents had. His soul was still there, she'd let him cherish it for another night or two.

"A poor one, perhaps.." Did he have a father or a brother or trainyard of friends that were slaughtered in their beds like lambs on the altar of clean white sheets? She jiggled the lighter in her fingers, to coax him once more to take a cigarette.

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[info]clowning
2010-06-22 05:53 am UTC (link)
Ah, cigarettes. The bait was claimed without any heedful falter. Naughty little wondering fox. Now, much like your paw tenderly clamped within the metal of the hunters ambush, your parched throat and eddied mind will enjoy the sedation that follows suit with surrendering to temptation, but you'll fail to recall why it was you did at all. Smoking. An immobilization of his equilibrium for only a limited time. He hated transient things; limited-time-only offers! And all the world was filled with them! Even her laugh was fleeting as a milkweed on the breeze, off to sink into the earth somewhere else far away from the conversation.

"Thanks." he'd said, "I quit a long time ago." he'd continued, acting as if this were no big deal. It wasn't. Big deals were subjective.

The lighter was taken as well, engrossed though still in her very isolated story. There were details she was probably deliberately overlooking. It was probably polite of him to overlook them to. But, he did so love to pry. It was as well most unfortunate that she was only joking with him on account of all that glorious, imaginary, steaming murder. Life lacked such color lately! Where were all the scandals? He'd thought to himself, as he'd tilted his head and lit the end of the cigarette. The ember glowed orange and soft as the inside of a jack-o-lantern lit on halloween, faded, and the smoke billowed up to no where. At least he hadn't the urge to cough.

"How terrible, but you were on your way somewhere. And if it wasn't to murder, what was it for?" examining the filter of the cigarette itself as he handed back her property, he inspected it for its brand. Before he could rouse himself to caring for any of the familiarity he might have felt for its name, the flood that only those select few who do not smoke regularly gently impacted his mind. That sensation of the ground coming up beneath him was a welcomed change. He grinned and insouciantly hummed aloud. He was a shameless man, and even shut his eyes to enjoy himself as if her being present didn't subjugate his nature at all. "Oh, it's making me dizzy, but go ahead, please. I'd love the answer. Hopefully it's ghost hunting. I'd like company while bumbling around like a fool looking for nothing."

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[info]shebringscurses
2010-06-23 10:50 pm UTC (link)
The lighter was filed away inside the cigarette box, where a hollow befell the absence of a half dozen factory-rolled vices. Their bleached filters all boasted the same trademark newsprint, Marlboro. She tucked the pack within one of the snug straps of her slip, leaving it to jut from her collar like a casual replacement for pockets.

"I was actually just finding it difficult to sleep.." Maybe her answer was simple, and a little too easy to be believed. She hesitated for a moment, tapping her thumbnail to send smoldering ashes to the floor, where she ran their coal black smear into the carpet with the ball of her foot. It was a conscious drop in attention as she listened to the absence of life from around them.

"Sometimes taking a walk can help. Or it can lead to many other reasons to stay awake." The warm chocolate of her eyes was almost off-putting when they rose again, they were so inherently kind. One of these things is not like the other.

"Tell me, Mr. Glass, what talents do you have?" The question really might have seemed to have come out of left field. It was no secret to Vaughn, although it would likely be news to this new fish, that almost everyone who moved into Bellum could do something better than the rest.

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[info]clowning
2010-06-23 11:35 pm UTC (link)
"What talents do I have?" The eyes once closed before snapped open and alert like the pulling paper curtain of a window outstretched and abruptly let go. There was a very concise masquerade that'd occurred in a lentissimo fantasyland of unsteadiness, to boot, an array of masks made mostly to look like animals. Sprawling now on the sticky floor of his vivid ingenuity, the attention that had phoenix'd back to the present was pointed like an aztecs dagger. He'd not let himself be troubled with imagining places elsewhere while feeling dizzy! "That's a rather odd question which could be confused in a quieter mind, but fortunately for you, my mind's unquiet. How to answer that precisely is what's going to be the feat."

Bringing both of his lips into his mouth, he slowly began to rove his eyes upward as if there may be a helpful hint, formula, or a technical breakdown of his talents there upon the ceiling, 100% in list form, and conveniently located just above. Wouldn't that be nice? Perhaps, comfortably snuggled with the asbestos, there could be tiny slip of flag-like shape, reading him a sort of fortune of all his glories. Alas, all he saw was predictably that darkly flashy decor which was there previously when he'd looked, and oh, no directions had taken shape. His eyes came back down from their visit to the beyond, and he grinned. The grin could embroider multi-colored maiden's Mexican peasant dresses, or even inspire the golden curve of a cobras neck upon the bejeweled crown of a pharaoh. He'd won invisible awards for that grin. The trophies having taken residency within the pathway of his mental accomplishments and real or imagined, physical achievements. In the form of favors for the welfare of others. Such a blessing!

Was not his talent merely being more useful than others, in a cavalcade of indistinct and unspecified ways?

"I'm a magician." he began, "I'm an illusionist, an escapist, a hypnotist, a diviner, a poet, a madman, a monk, a sinner, a sage, a saint, a baker of cake, an adventurer of the senses, an appreciator of all things cajoled by poignancy, an admirer of the hidden universe. Are those talents? In a world where no one examines their life, thinks about thinking, or realizes experience is the key to unlocking hidden truths and insights into the world... perhaps so." and in conclusion, he'd gotten his cigarette, held it up opposing to his other hand (after of course inhaling a tuft of smoke one last time, and exhaling it quickly.) and smashed it there. Or so it seemed, until he clasped both hands together, pressing his palms, wringing his fingers.

And then he held both of his hands up and opened. The cigarette, ashes and evidence, were gone. A typical trick.

"What about you, insomniac Jane? Who is right about taking walks, they do help. Of that I agree."

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[info]shebringscurses
2010-06-25 04:11 am UTC (link)
Oh, ever the showman! How could she even bat an ink roped lash at the shared confidence of his sorcery. A magician, you say? Well, darling, climb up on this burning stake just beside me! The witches and the wizards of this building will always be the last one's standing, an eternity of smoke billowing from the gallows of their throats and the sanctimonious clutch of their swift knuckles. Vaughn very nearly warned him against admitting a proclivity for magic amongst these bloodhungry saints, but thought better of it. These idiots would probably hire him for birthday parties and parlor tricks, they were easily swayed by anything new and shiny.

Then again, so was she.

When that cigarette vanished, he broke loose the brackets of a tempest's smile. "Bravo," her approval echoed by a demure patter of her fingertips, which were surely satanically cloven in a truer light.

"I'm a librarian," she offered. Then, lifting the dwindling smolder of her cigarette in gesture, continued, "And I'm a smoker. I'm a reader that has never baked a cake. I'm a heartbroken daydreamer.." Was she lying yet?

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[info]clowning
2010-06-25 04:56 am UTC (link)
"Heartbroken." Curious and disbelieving in an equal timber was his mere repeating of the word she'd selected, and there was a fine, yet distinctive stitching of sympathy just underneath the hem of an inculpate dubiety. Studying her now underneath the sallow, emaciated light, seemed somehow to yield more abundant results about her unsolved mysteries. It was because he had decided to believe anything she'd said, or at least to go along with it. When he met new people there was never a reason to doubt them--in time, all people provide their own reasons to be doubted-and ah! If she were being untrue, all the merrier. Lying is an art he knows well. Lies were the true creativity of a defunct, steaming, rueful soul!

"A transient case. An unfortunate and temporary condition. Those with hearts to begin with, capable of being broken, never truly break entirely. People with real heart are stubborn. The state of the heart is very atomic. Atoms, atomos, meaning uncuttable. They're uncuttable. The state of being heartbroken, well, it's kind of a cardiac amnesia, until the next exciting thing makes you remember what it's like, makes you want to glue the pieces together. Try again."

The high, slant arch of his dark brow was a trick he'd learned from the devil in a dream and employed to bring his philosophy to conclusion. He'd also hired a devilish lambency to raise the curtains of his wily smile. Very faint blood-blue crescent moons were boated by his eyes, and he blinked repeatedly.

"But librarians, those are the true low-lives. My God, Jane. We can't possibly be acquaintances now." and in direct opposition to that, he'd said. "Let's take a walk and look for ghosts, then. Before I was a little scared to go it alone. They won't mess with a librarian, though. I'll feel much safer." he thrilled one initiatory step forward into another direction. Probably, toward stairs instead of an elevator.

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[info]shebringscurses
2010-06-25 05:25 am UTC (link)
The heart was uncuttable?

The muddy brown of her irises swelled with bemused interest, patronizingly rapt with attention for his florid explanation on the subject of heartache. Spoken like any sociopathic lothario or psychward patient! Where did this mischief maker conceive such celestially unusual theories? And how?

"Pretty to think so." Didn't he know that it was scientifically proven; the heart could be cleaved in half, be it by hatchet or dismissive word. There was no gluing the pieces back together, only repeating the offense to others. It was an unending cycle, like that of a serpent swallowing it's own tail.

Still, she stamped the deadland remains of her cigarette against the door sill of lucky number eight-oh-one, and started toward him when he continued his passionate mention of ghost hunting. Falling into the form of a traditional pilgrimage alongside him, barefoot and all, Vaughn gestured toward the stairs. She was uncertain of whether he was the type to tempt the elevator's wrath twice in one night.

"Downstairs.." Surely ghosts were jealous of heavenly altitudes and preferred to stay more earthbound. It only made sense that they would hang below levels, halfway to the river Styx.

"Although I'm not sure I'll be able to save you. You'll just have to concoct some magic to make them believe we're dead as well." Spoken in a manner that said she knew that wasn't beyond his level of expertise.

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[info]clowning
2010-06-25 05:59 am UTC (link)
Ah, Jane was a materialist... if only he could read her thoughts!

"I don't believe in ghosts the way that other people do. There's a perfectly rational scientific theory, in fact." he brought his hands out in front of him for her to see, flicking the cuffs of his sleeves up with a sharp twist of his wrists. It was so that the sleeves of his tail coat would ascend his elbows without farther effort. He was such a lazy lout. "Say that my left hand is the past, my right the present. Time is non-linear, but spacetime is one big, tube-like room on the outskirts of reality. Time also has a wacky way of informing itself, or whispering little secrets to the present--which can't be depicted here not only because I don't have a third hand, but also because it isn't here yet--to the future. And although the past can't be altered, it has been shown to communicate with the present. At least on a very delicate, quantum level. It's a very long explanation..." he pressed both of his hands together, fingers interlacing. "Time looks more like this, than separated. It's called entanglement."

To distract her from immersing herself into the cooling idea that his jargon was tedious and tiresome, he ventured to reach behind her ear, though he did not touch her. Not an accidentally phantom stroke of the cloth edge of his sleeve, nothing. And produced a red rose which he offered it to her at once. Yes, he did keep these up his sleeves. And for just these occasions. "You can leave it at someone's door. How nice for them to wake up and find it."

How drab these people's doors were. How drab these people's hallways were. They needed something... something odd. Something that made no sense. Ah ha! Flyers! Flyers for... he'd test it out on Jane first. Many comedians do this, examine reactions first, and of course, with the utter seriousness with which a comedian summons to tell one of his tall tales, Miles inquired deliberately and genuinely:

"Jane? ... have you seen a king cobra around here by any chance? It was in my basket this morning and I haven't been able to find him ever since. He comes to the name Ra."

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[info]shebringscurses
2010-06-26 06:21 am UTC (link)
Miles was a scientist now?

Vaughn remained admirably silent as the man waxed theoretical during their descent through the stairwell. The stairs had always been Vaughn's favorite, she knew that their emptiness pulled echoes through this pipeline of chaos, up and up to her dearest on the roof. Surely the sound was so magnified at that level -- so captured and siphoned and pure -- that even her heartbeat must have rattled his windows like thunder.

Miles' hand swept dangerously close, and the banshee in woman's clothing jerked with a defensive snarl-curl of her lip. But the rose left her a blank-eyed susan, blinking with a tint of self-effaced pink rising to the shore of wane cheeks. If a Witch was even capable of embarrassment, that might have been the turn in her expression; from carnivorous to modestly discharged.

"Thank you," a shared whisper as she collected the flower and curled it's stem in her hands. Vaughn knew just the man to leave it for, of course. A rose by any other name came only from their tale.

"King cobra?" From her confusion over the flower, she fell into an effortless tone of amusement. Surely people did not actually keep those things. She quirked a brow and jaunted down several more stairs ahead of him with a swift suddenness. Her words carried behind her, like the drag of funeral bells, "I think we would all come to the name Ra..."

If given the choice.

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[info]clowning
2010-06-26 06:48 am UTC (link)
Oh, that maniacs laughter. It was high and low, chirping, sacred and profane, bubbling, a prostitute's grapefruit body spray, skittering, the incandescent glitter of an acrobat who loves with a love that's more than love--it poetically saturated the stairwell like a smoke bomb on a Parisian subway, and yet was as demented as Frederick Nietzsche's 'letters from syphillis.' It was primal and for that absolved. It provided residents odd circus intervals to their dreams and made villains blush with its artificial purity. He'd caught the innuendo she'd thrown with the finesse of the aforementioned acrobat, minus the glitter for this set, during the tossing of his partner by way of the triple aerial assault.

Ahem.

"Yes, a king cobra. He's very poisonous. I wouldn't recommend petting him. He's got to be around here somewhere. I'm sure he'll find his way back." he followed after her of course, though kept behind on purpose eventually. He was not only staring out of the windows to see precisely where he was in relation to his own hovel, but the view of Jane at this angle was rather pleasing as well.

"Oh, what's this." he'd inquired, though mostly to himself. It was a small note! "Jane! I found gossip!" he bent down to pick it up and began shamelessly unfolding it.

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[info]shebringscurses
2010-06-27 06:06 am UTC (link)
There was no need in mentioning her intentions for this snake, should she find it. If Miles was serious in it's wandering existence, and should Vaughn cross it, she'd chop loose it's hooded head with a rake. A fine death for any cobra, be they Ra or Antoinette! And, if Miles was trying to kid her.. well, there was no point in indulging the man, was there?

Silence ran deep until he chirped a mockingbird holler, and Vaughn spun with undeniably pinched and curious eyes. Her gaze holding the cloudy depth and intensity of a good espresso when she stepped toward him once in cat-killing curiosity, "Gossip?"

Speak again bright angel!

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[info]clowning
2010-06-27 06:45 am UTC (link)
"Oh, pfffft." He fashioned for her a fine and casual, startlingly accurate rendition of a farting noise by use of the side of his mouth and tongue. "It's a list of groceries to get and... oh, there is something good." Clearing his throat dramatically with an over exaggerated EH-HEM which tumbled down the stairwell like an elementary school butterball, he'd straightened up his posture as if an invisible cord held his spine slave and decided now was the time to put him to use.

"I have seen your face a thousand times, yet I do not know you.
Your voice is a song I have heard in my dreams forever, yet your face is one I have never seen.
You, whom I do not know, how strange it is for me to love you.
And in a place I've never been."


And, on cue, he began laughing. Not to mock the tenderness of the admission, no, nor even entirely because it was lame, but because it was delightfully honest and altogether too sweet.

"The next door I see is getting this slipped underneath it."

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