тнє вιg вα∂ ωσℓf (redruby) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2017-07-17 13:09:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, kenzi malikov, ruby lucas (little red riding hood) |
Who: Ruby & Kenzi
What: Reunited and catching up over drinks, with some dream talk
When: This weekend
Where: A snazzy burlesque club in the OC
Rating/Warnings: Mostly low, unless dirty-titled drinks are offensive
Status: Complete
Ruby was all for burlesque. All for it. It was an empowering form of expression for women of all shapes and sizes and ethnicities - and babes with their bottoms shaking in all those glitzy bits? Of course she’d be all for that. The shows could vary, sort of be in between vampy vixen or some old-school, retro glamour - but either way it was a good time. Costumes! Music and theatrics! Stomping on the bar and hotties with hula hoops! Fire twirlers and garter belts! There was a DJ who spun some tunes in between sets to keep things moving and grooving, and presumably give the crowd time to mix and mingle. The ambiance of the club was loose and relaxed, one might even call it old-fashioned with the way the sweet scent of smoke wafted in from the patio reserved for lighting up cigars; on the inside, it was lit by candles and littered with squishy, comfortable couches. So kitschy yet sexy, but that was burlesque for you. It was set to be a fun night out with a friend. Especially because she’d ordered a plate of bon-bons and was currently sipping on a chocolate martini. Indulgence. This was why Ruby knew she could never be a model full time. But hey, her dress was super adorable. Black and white gingham with a cute sweetheart neckline. She’d probably be bursting out of it by the end of the adventure, still, worth it. Because did she forget to mention - chocolate martini. “So you definitely have to introduce me to your boyfriend,” she said before taking a bite of her latest pick from the plate - salted maple bacon bon-bon. Mmm. “Though this probably isn’t his kind of place, huh?” Definitely Kenzi’s scene. All forms of fashion were accepted (but even if it wasn’t, had that ever stopped her before?) and she dressed in her own unique brand of style - a jacket with corset designs on the back and spikes on the shoulders, the knuckle-heeled shoes (a relic from Undercounty, thanks Hades), all brought together by a itty-bitty leather dress. A gothic princess dressed like she was auditioning to be eye candy for a biker gang. Was that a thing with biker gangs? Probably. Depending on the gang, anyway. “Any place with people isn’t his kind of place,” she snorted, pacing herself between drinks - because she wasn’t sipping a cocktail, nope, Kenzi was taking shots. Her Russian-Irish liver was steely and hell, can’t deny she didn’t need it. Her heart ached in ways it shouldn’t, and in the dreams she could see herself crumbling in a world she didn’t belong in. Friendships that meant everything for her decayed when they put Hale to rest. Trying to shrug it off and continue living normally was what she needed to do, and she needed to do it with someone else. A breath of fresh air that didn’t remind her of it all. Ruby was an old friend, too, and she didn’t realize how bad she missed her company until times like these. “Sometimes he does come out, though. Mostly to please my itch of raves and clubbing and seeing glittering titty-tassles on stage - I made those, the ones with the tentacles?” Because it was always about the tentacles. “Oh, no way!” Ruby beamed so proudly, as if had been her own self who designed the very fashionable nip covers. It was mostly that she liked getting excited with friends about their accomplishments - friends lifting up friends and celebrating! All the celebrations, all the time. Much better than focusing on strange dreams that weren’t the result of the cliched cold lo mein before bed? “That’s awesome. So you’ve got kind of a side gig going with that?” she asked, taking a sip of her drink which was basically grownup chocolate milk. Smoooooth, and so creamy. “If you need someone to model your wares and take photos or whatever, for advertisements, I’ll totally do it.” She’d just make sure to lay off the truffles before that, and maybe amp up the morning runs. Plus, there were like five-thousand calories in this drink. Good thing her metabolism wasn’t completely shot yet. “A side-gig sort of hobby. Doesn’t make as much as toejam or used panties to sell to pervs, sadly.” Sigh. Those were the days, but Big Brother insisted she stop. Kenzi listened to give him a peace of mind. But overall, she prided herself in being a Jill-Of-All-Trades - she ran the administrative side of JR Investigation and with Birkhoff’s help, her computer skills were boss (she began honing a degree of hacking abilities), she could impersonate and pick locks, create and design plenty of accessories worthy of an Etsy Shop. Her latest talent involved the skills of a ‘shadow thief,’ something Dyson had been training her in the dreams to do. It involved being able to steal panties while people were still wearing them. Shhh, the mechanics of how that worked were a secret. Her poison was vodka, straight, no flavorings other than delicious gasoline, and she picked up the tall shot glass that contained it. “But I’m totes liking that idea, you wouldn’t mind? If I put pictures of you online to show how my stuff looks on people, you know someone’s going to like, be fapping to your pictures.” Grossest form of flattery but still flattery, she guessed? Alright, call her twelve years old, but the word fapping definitely gave Ruby the giggles. She carefully set down the elegant martini glass before she ended up spilling something, her eyes watering a bit and making the green in them look more radioactive. “I mean, if they’re going to jack their beanstalk over some random chick online wearing a sparkly thong, then they’d pretty much do it to anything,” she laughed. “So no, I don’t care. Besides, this is what friends do for each other - help them expand their empire of panties and nipple tassels.” It was kind of flattering, in a weird sort of way. But even so, pictures of her modeling shoots were out there too - granted, she’d worn a bit more clothing for those. Still. “I probably need to get back into modeling some anyway,” she sighed. “Add stuff to my portfolio. My job hunt for something in my would-be field isn’t going so great.” Giggle like a twelve year old all you want, Rubycakes, because jacking the bean stalk officially won the award for the ‘best way to ever describe a handjob.’ “Hells yes, then, and you being my model-muse means you get to have some of the merch. Gonna make your buttfloss sparkle like no one’s business.” A true commitment of friendship. Tossing her head back, she downed the shot and slammed the glass onto the table. Please, sirs, give her another in the next fifteen minutes or so because it was on like Donkey Kong. “You mean the whole criminal justice stuff?” she asked, wiping the corner of her mouth daintily - she wore a little gloss on her lips today, but the focus of the makeup was always on those silvery blue eyes. Such a stark contrast to that pitch black mane of straight hair. “Why the interest in that career, though? Thug life stopped choosing you?” “I don’t know - it’s just always something I’ve been interested in ever since I could remember. I’m good at solving mysteries and finding things,” Ruby grinned. “I’m not reeeeally cut out for the thug life - being with dear ol’ mom showed me that.” Anita was kinda cool and all, but that was not best as a long-term arrangement. As much as Red hated to admit that Granny may be right about one thing. Kenzi got more shots, and Ruby decided to get some too - her half-pirate friend was great at taking the straight stuff (and Ruby could too, when the mood struck her) but she wanted something mixed. Hence - “I’ll take cunnilingus, please,” she told the waitress, and to her credit, with a straight face. Irish cream, peach schnapps, pineapple juice. Shaken, strained into a shot glass with whipped cream on top. Hells yeah (she’d take actual cunnilingus too, but hadn’t really met anyone who seemed like they’d be decent at it around here - a shame). “How do you like working as a sort-of-PI? Do you get to go on fun cases?” Kenzi got that, she really did - and while she missed some parts herself, she knew she was better away from it. But the tricks and all the neat hacks, she’d keep those for a rainy day. Never know when you needed to snatch someone’s credit card or slip out of handcuffs, or hotwire a car. That third one was super handy. A good buzz going on, she leaned back against the cushy seats and stretched her arms across the top in thought. “It’s amazeballs practice for whenever I start getting my license to, you know, be legit and stuff - but there’s a lot of missing persons missing, or trying to find a long lost relative. And when someone’s being a homewrecker.” Should revenge be added to the list, too? That had to go without saying. “Maybe you should get a foot in the door with something like, uh, a receptionist sort of thing? Administrative? Sexy cop secretary?” Eyebrow waggle. “There’s gotta be something, Rubycakes. If you want I can beg Killian to take you along with us one of these days to get a crash course at playing stalker.” “You should totally do that anyway, it sounds fun,” Ruby decided, taking her first shot and knocking it back - oh, and getting a little bit of whipped cream on the tip of her nose too but no big deal. She wiped it off with a laugh before anyone could mistake her for coke-face. “I’ll look around some more though. I actually met some cop on the network, who dreams of being a fox? He wasn’t very friendly, but - “ Dreams of being a fox. Yep, that’s when she took another shot. The booze was slithering through her system and felt nice and warm. A hug from the inside. It took the edge off any potential dream talk though granted, Ruby herself didn’t have much to talk about there. But anyway. Cough. She did love her some Irish cream. “You’re right, there’s gotta be something.” Hey, this girl was pretty determined when she put her mind to it. She wouldn’t be solely cooking breakfasts for strangers much longer. Like, an actual fox? What the shit? Kenzi wanted to ask, but, eh, not like Ruby would know much anyway - just another weird fact in this hellhole. “You could bat your pretty lashes and sweet talk him into getting some intel,” she suggested, the smirk on her lips sly. “I mean, lookit you, hot stuff. But then there’s the whole dignity thing and then there’s the fact that he could turn into a fox some day so that’d be kinda weird.” Though she was sure her friend here would get something. She reached over, going to (somewhat drunkenly) pinch those beauuuuuuutiful cheeks (the ones on her face, not the booty). “You is kiiiiiind, you is preeeetty, you is smaaaaaaaart, and all those things will get you to where you want to be because you’re more amazing than sunshine.” Because yass, bitches, friends lifting themselves up and showering each other with praises and love. Aw, Kenzi was so sweet, wasn’t she? Ruby may have flushed a little scarlett, true to her namesake - she acted like she had confidence up the wazoo but sometimes, she just didn’t really feel it. Wasn’t as if she thought she was a total loser or anything, no, but she simply felt a little lost sometimes. Little Red all lost in the woods, that whole thing. Like she had yet to truly find herself. But yeah, she wasn’t sure if she wanted to bat her lashes in the direction of the Foxy Police Officer. She doubted it would do much good, if he was that out of touch with his nightstick as he appeared to be. “Do people actually turn into foxes around here?” she asked in disbelief. “What do you dream about? I never asked.” Then she added as a disclaimer, “...but if you don’t wanna talk about it, that’s cool. No pressure.” “I mean, they turn into aliens and other things? A fox, though - I don’t know about that one,” she admitted with a spiked shrug (let a skeezy fella try and get comfy with her, they would get stabbed by those shoulderguards). “My friend -” best friend was what she meant to say, but for some reason it just didn’t roll off her tongue and it felt odd, “turned into a succubus. We dream about a world with an underground race called the fae, and they live among humans in hiding. Usually for food. Her thing is sex energy, and just general life chi but she’s got some weird blood and is meant to be some kind of dark queen, I don’t know.” Sometimes Kenzi looked back at the things she dreamt and realized it made shit sense, or she was on a show labeled ‘Bo’s Life.’ Literally everyone dropped everything for her. Dyson, Lauren, Tamsin, all of them pussywhipped and she was beginning to kind of...wake up? Be fed up with it all? Considering at Hale’s funeral some Knight came around pledge her life to Bo and worship her like royalty? Yeah, nothing was sacred. Kenzi had stormed off when that happened. “Things are just at the point where they’re a little cray, y’know?” The cocktail waitress was flagged down for another round, por favor. “The kind of cray that makes me wanna drink and pretend it’s not happening.” Whoa, sex energy was not something that Ruby was expecting. She listened to the whole explanation, all with a slow eyebrow raise - and ceased with the whole plowing herself with alcohol thing. At least for the time being. “Okay, so your friend’s some fae queen, but what about you?” she wanted to know. “Do you like, just dream about your friend as the queen? Because that would suck. Yoooooou - “ Here was where Ruby playfully tweaked her friend’s nose (maybe she was a little sloshed, but was that a bad thing? They could just Uber back home). “....you is kind, pretty, smart. And way awesome. I’d watch the Kenzi Show.” It actually sounded like she was sick of playing second fiddle to someone? Maybe? Ruby guessed she didn't blame her for that. All the influx of bad mojo feelings could also be a knee-jerk reaction to what happened with Hale, and it’s not like she got to avenge him - trust her, she tried - with Bo wanting to keep Massimo alive for whatever fucking reasons. It all left Kenzi feeling ill, tired, and wanting to be elsewhere than to deal with the latest apocalyptic situation of hell’s gate spewing things at them, a la Bo’s mysterious father (also obsessed with her). “Stop being so in lesbians with me,” joked the mini-pirate with a giggle and playfully flirtatious smile - too bad she was as straight as an arrow, otherwise Ruby would be totes on her ‘to do’ list. “But I’m basically the human sidekick balls deep in a society I’m not even part of, and all it’s done is bitten me in the sideboob.” Kenzi had chosen Bo over her last relationship, but this recently finished one thanks to death was a little different. It was to a siren. And she’d been willing to deal with it for Hale, too. “Things are super tense in the dreams with us, and are getting a little weird here too. I think I just need space. From her. Until I just figure things out.” It’s also not like she’d ever stop loving or caring for Bo, either. Bo was her sister of the heart. Sisters fought. But it was time for her to be a little selfish for once, too. “Space can be a good thing sometimes. It can help you get perspective and stuff,” Ruby mused. So wise, even while intoxicated - it was like all the thoughts just came at her. “And I mean, I don’t know the whole situation - but to me you’re way more than the sidekick.” She slid another shot in her direction, clinking it against Kenzi’s glass, all before knocking it back as a shiver passed through her. Alcohol, work your healing magic. “In fact, I’d say we’re like two equal she-wolves. A pack - except smaller.” Did that make any sense? If a pack could actually exist with only a duo, but whatever, bending the rules a little wasn’t a bad thing in this case. Awwww, Rubycakes was the cutest. Nothing was better than having swimmy-drunk feels of fluttering butterflies with a good friend - better than being a sad, clingy drunk. “You stooooooooppit,” she hiccuped, pushing her gently with a p’shaw hand. “You’re cute. But, like, you know you’re probably gonna get hit with your own thing, right? With all this?” Kenzi hoped not. In the scheme of things it wasn’t like every single resident within the county dreamt, either. The dreamer community was select and small, even if it didn’t seem that way sometimes. “It can get - hic - ugly. Should we have sleepovers? We should have sleepovers. I need to make sure you’re still breathing at all times.” Was there a chance that she’d stop breathing? What the hell? Ruby was suddenly concerned. Okay, so there was the whole magic thing and the people-as-foxes and the talk of alternate universes and shit, but how did someone just quit inhaling oxygen? Danger, Will Robinson! “I’m all for sleepovers,” she hiccuped too, then decided to go for another bon-bon, since stuffing her face would help - food absorbed alcohol, right? Probably not sugar to this degree, but whatever. The hangover food, like hash browns and waffles, would come the next day. “Because I’m guessing I will have my own dreams? I talked to my interior designer - or actually, she’s working on the bathrooms for the B&B - and she said I’d recognize people I also know here?” Like Regina herself, perhaps? Ruby didn’t know how it all would play out, she was still in the dark. Fooooood. Kenzi swiped one for herself, too, she needed something to absorb the incoming shots. “You spoke to -” Hmmmmmm, her sister-in-law (or soon to be, legally, but she did live with them almost fifty percent of the time) was the only interior designer she knew that dreamt, come to think of it. Maybe there was another one? “Did you talk to Gigi? In Garden Grove? Because if you did that’s amazeballs, I live there sometimes and she’s engaged to my - burp - excuse you, toots, she’s engaged to my brother. Snow White’s Evil Queen and Captain Hook, a fanfic waiting to happen.” They were so adooorbs, too. Killian had been such a ho before they got together. And she was on the committee of helping decorate the Jolly Roger for their wedding (at the instruction of the bride-to-be, she was picky). “Theirs is a lot of fairytale stuff. Disney on LSD sort of thing? Maybe you guys will have it in common.” “Really?? Oh yeah, that was her,” Ruby was so excited by this information - what a coincidence! Kenzi hadn’t been home when she visited, so there was no putting two and two together that she lived there, but that was still good to know. “I didn’t know she was the Queen though...the Evil one. Or that your brother is Captain Hook.” Kenzi was related to someone but didn’t share the same dreamscape? Now that was trippy. And further just confirmed that Ruby had no idea how all this stuff was supposed to work. She supposed she’d see for herself eventually, she guessed. “I guess I’d take Disney on LSD. So maybe we do have it it common.” If only she realized the complete and utter twisted mess she was about to find herself in, but for now? Ignorance was bliss and shots were good. Half-brother, really, but the technicalities didn’t matter to her - he was more family than her mother, and always would be. “Yep, one look at us and you’d think we’re twinsies,” Kenzi winked. “But, yeah, that house? Casa of Villains. They’re total woobies though, you should hear them talk to the baby.” Ever want to not be intimidated by two classic evil-doers? Yeah, listen to them with their spawn. That was a hoot. “It’s always nice to have people around who experience the same kind of crazy you do, though. That way you get an idea of what to expect? And hopefully they’ll warn you if you like, die, or lose a hand.” Speaking from experience. Man, Killian bled a lot that day. “Yeah, it’d be great to be warned if I die,” Ruby snorted, covering her nose (and swiping the whipped cream from her latest drunken shot off as well). “If that happens and someone doesn’t tell me, I think we’d have words. But we’ll see what happens.” She was good with riding the wave for now - not really fighting it, but also not letting it drown her this soon. Ruby remained...cautious. Which, around here? Probably wasn’t a bad way to be. |