❄️❄️❄️Frozen Fractals❄️❄️❄️ (show_yourself) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2018-05-06 15:08:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, bo dennis, chloe price, elsa of arendelle, logan howlett (wolverine) |
Who: Elsa and Chloe, ft. Logan Howlett and Bo Dennis
What: Meeting and drinking
When: Before the Orcs
Where: Out
Status: Complete
Rating: PG-13
As a rule, Elsa tended to avoid loud places and crowded places.
Also, as a rule, Elsa tended to not complain or argue when she could avoid it. So as people started to crowd in she kept moving over until she was at the end of the bar, with an entire crowd full of people between her and the exit. A crowd in leather and colorful hair and more piercings than she’d ever seen in her life. She didn’t look like she belonged. At all.
Because of these rules, what had started out as a quiet drink turned into an audio nightmare when a band took the stage and started playing something that could only loosely be described as music.
Spotting an opening, Elsa started to weave through the crowd.
Chloe was not reacting well at all to the accident she’d been in. She was grateful to have been healed (and she’d hugged the woman when that was done, not caring that she had no idea who she was, she’d just been willing to heal her and let her out of the hospital), but that had only healed her physical injuries. Her mental ones were still there, and they ran deep. Old wounds were open again, and she wasn’t sleeping that well.
Alcohol, screaming at trains and loud music tended to be the best thing for her, though if she were honest with herself she was highly tempted to contact Katou and ask him for some cocaine or something. She couldn’t stand it, so she’d decided to go look for an outlet. Not wanting to bother Rachel given her boyfriend, not wanting to bother Ilia yet again, and not wanting to worry Jaina more, Chloe went to see about getting some alcohol. She had a fake ID, and wondered if she’d be able to find a bar that would accept it and serve her. She was walking past one that looked semi-promising, but then she heard loud music and she perked up instantly.
The bleach blonde entered the bar, clad in torn jeans, boots, tank top with a skull on it, several bracelets on both of her wrists and a choker with chains on it around her neck. The full sleeve tattoo on her right arm was fully visible, and she had to grin a bit as she saw the people gathered for the music. She was starting to push her way through the crowd when she accidentally bumped into someone.
“Oh, sorry!!” She exclaimed over the music, looking at the other young woman. Chloe wasn’t wearing leather at all and had quite a few less visible piercings and less tattoos than a lot of the other people here, and the other blonde didn’t exactly seem to fit here. Perhaps she was trying to make an escape?
"Sorry!" Elsa said, nearly at the same time. She'd had her head down, and her braid had come mostly undone. Her hair was the kind of blonde that was almost white in the right lighting and she'd put on make-up that made her eyelids sparkle. Between that, a navy blue skirt and matching blouse (that also seemed to sparkle a bit like ice), she definitely didn't belong at a metal concert.
She tried to give Chloe a smile, but it was obvious she was out of her element.
The woman’s hair was an intriguing color, but it was definitely easy for Chloe to recognize that she was definitely out of her element. She kind of felt bad for her, the crowd must’ve descended fast enough that she hadn’t had time to get out earlier.
She was about to say something when movement out of the corner of her eye caught her attention. A mosh pit was starting and people were starting to push and shove. So, ever the samaritan, even when she was in distress, she quickly grabbed the other woman’s wrist and pulled her towards the exit quickly before she got enveloped by moshers.
“Sorry about that, but you really don’t want to get stuck in a mosh pit,” Chloe said once they were to safety, letting go of her wrist and smiling a bit.
“Thanks,” Elsa said, smoothing her hand over her hair and trying to fix her braid. “How chivalrous of you.” She took a deep breath, then looked at Chloe more fully with soulful blue eyes. “Serves me right for not paying attention to the band announcements. But I’m not sure ‘Razorclaw is performing’ really told me much.”
“You’re welcome. I have my chivalrous moments,” she commented with an easy grin. Though she didn’t completely feel the grin, but she didn’t need to dump her problems on a stranger. “Razorclaw is a wonderfully neutral band name that could fit into more than one genre of music. Not exactly that original, either.”
“Like someone you’ve heard before, but you can’t quite place it because it’s really familiar?” Elsa asked. Braid in a proper state, she gave Chloe a soft smile. “I wasn’t looking for a knight, but thanks again. I’m Elsa.”
“Yeah, like that.” Sometimes bands needed to choose their names wisely so that they could stand out from everyone else. Instant recognition went a long way in music. “You’re welcome. Sometimes knights just appear when you need them.” And sometimes they didn’t, but Chloe didn’t mention that part. “I’m Chloe, it’s nice to meet you.” She said with a smile.
Elsa could, technically, knight someone if she chose, but she didn’t know if the other woman would get that joke, so she kept it to herself. “Let me buy you a drink? Someplace quieter, if you don’t mind?”
“I’m not going to say no to a drink, so I don’t mind somewhere quieter.” Chloe would never turn down a drink offer like that. Unless it came from some skeevy type of dude, of course. And Elsa seemed more like the quiet, nice type of person than someone who’d go around drugging people or something.
And Chloe was just going to keep the fact she was underage a secret because she seriously needed the alcohol.
If Elsa suspected Chloe was underage, she wasn’t letting on. And she wasn’t suspecting. Even if she wasn’t frazzled from the music, she likely wouldn’t have noticed. Besides, you needed ID to get a drink and they’d both be carded.
At least she better be carded. “What about that place down the street?”
Chloe had gone to great lengths to make a very convincing fake ID. Most people never caught it, and sometimes she wasn’t even carded. She supposed she looked older than she actually was. The giant tattoo on her arm probably helped, and she generally looked like someone that had lived longer than she had after everything she’d been through already.
“That works for me,” she said with a nod. She hadn’t been to many of the bars in the area yet, so she was willing to try it. Besides, better to know which places carded, which ones didn’t and which ones actually picked up that her ID was fake.
“The Nightcrawler? Like the worm?” Elsa asked, looking up at the sign. No worm, but what looked like a fuzzy blue devil.
She shrugged and entered, holding the door for Chloe. “After you.”
Chloe looked up at the sign, wondering what the fuzzy blue devil had to do with a nightcrawler, but she shrugged it off. “Thanks,” she said and walked in and looked around. The place actually looked pretty decent. She then caught sight of the bartender who...happened to be a busty, hot-as-fuck brunette woman.
“Fuck me,” she muttered, hopefully not too loud.
While it may not quite have been a whole month since her death experience, Bo was going crazy just sitting around at home. She knew she wasn’t really fit to work, but she really needed to do something productive. After all, she’d probably die of natural causes before this wound actually healed at the rate it was going. Bo wasn’t wearing a bra under her top, and she wouldn’t be wearing a bra for a very long time. She was in pain, but she was trying to power through it to at least do some work.
And for once, Bo’s top wasn’t as low cut as she typically wore at work. She was hiding the bandage over the wound. But there was enough cleavage showing to make people happy.
“Pardon?” Elsa asked, not entirely against the idea, mind, but it was a - Oh. Oh. She might have stared a little too hard, blushed a little too hard, and muttered a little too loudly, “Me too.”
Chloe was a little distracted. Alright, more than a little. That bartender was really hot. She heard Elsa’s mutter, but was still staring at Bo.
“Yeah…” But then she knew that if they wanted drinks, they needed to find their voices. Chloe cleared her throat and glanced at Elsa, noting that blush. “This might call for a stronger drink than I originally thought.” But hey, the eye candy at least distracted her from the storm that was raging inside her head.
“I think you might be right.” Elsa squared her shoulders, then walked to the bar like she was some kind of Queen. She took a stool, saving the other for Chloe and tried to keep her eyes on the bartender’s face. Why were women so hot? She’d always kind of noticed but they’d never really affected her until after Ozma.
This should be easy, but she found herself speechless.
Chloe moved up to the bar, taking the other stool and leaned her forearms on the bar. She glanced at Elsa, noticing that it seemed she was speechless. She looked back to the bartender and was ready to open her mouth when the bartender spoke first.
“Hello ladies, what can I get for you?” Bo asked, setting a glass down. That was when Chloe noticed the rings on her finger. Well, her spouse was definitely lucky.
“I’m gonna need a whiskey on the rocks,” Chloe stated. She definitely needed something stronger than beer.
“I’ll need to see your ID. And how about for you?” She asked Elsa.
The rings only made it a little bit easier to talk to the bartender. She was still strikingly attractive and Elsa cleared her throat as she pulled her ID out of her purse. “I’ll have the same.”
Bo was probably used to this woman having girls falling all over themselves in front of her, right? But she was married, and probably straight, because that’s how these things usually went.
Bo was certainly used to people, both men and women, falling all over themselves in front of her. “I’ll need to see your ID as well,” Bo said to Elsa. And then came the moment of truth as Chloe handed over her ID. Bo looked at it, then looked at Chloe, then back to the ID. “Nice try, Chloe. This might’ve worked with someone else, but I know fake IDs when I see them. Personal experience. Though it’s a pretty good one.” She said, handing the ID back.
“Damn it. Oh well, doesn’t hurt to try, right?” Chloe said with a bit of a fake smile. She could’ve really used that drink, damn it.
Elsa had her ID in her fingers in Bo’s direction. She turned to look at Chloe, quirking her eyebrow, “A fake ID. Really.”
Bo eyed Chloe, having thought about pretending she didn’t see that the ID was fake, but she felt Logan would’ve kicked her ass for serving someone underage, so she’d decided to play by the law. She then took Elsa’s ID and looked it over, satisfied that it was legit and handed it back before she went about making her a drink.
“Yeah, sue me, I’m underage,” Chloe responded. She turned around on the stool, leaning her elbows on the bar and looked around. This wasn’t what she’d been looking for to distract herself from her problems.
“It’s all right,” Elsa said. She’d have to figure out a way to make it up to Chloe, since it had been her idea to come here. “I think you just hot a little unlucky today.”
She blinked. “Got. Got.”
Logan peered out his office window just then and saw Bo. “...seriously?”
“More like I’m just unlucky in life, but that’s nothing new.” Chloe shrugged a shoulder. Everyone left her, and there were days where she wondered why the fuck she was still alive. People claimed to care until they didn’t.
Bo made a little face when she heard Logan’s voice. She gave Elsa her drink before turning around and giving Logan a tentative smile. “Hi. It’s been about a month, so here I am.” Yeah, like that was going to go over well. Especially since it wouldn’t take much to discern that Bo wasn’t healed yet.
Though she was kind of afraid she’d end up with no job because of it, so she was trying to play it off so she could work.
Logan rubbed his face, stepping out and marching over to her. Despite their height difference, he was clearly in charge. “What the fuck are you doing here. You got stabbed, you should be at home!”
Elsa was trying not to laugh a the height difference. Instead, she put a hand on Chloe’s shoulder and squeezed.
Their height difference all that ridiculous, Bo wasn’t that tall, and she wasn’t wearing heels either. “I can’t stand being at home and doing nothing anymore. I’m going to go crazy not having anything to do.”
Chloe glanced at Elsa, then she glanced back at the scene unfolding behind the bar.
“I will call your fucking wife,” Logan threatened.
Elsa looked between Chloe and the scene, feeling a little like they were watching something on a drama channel. Both of her eyebrows raised at ‘wife’ and she whispered to Chloe, “Very lucky woman.”
Bo sighed. “Alright! Fine. I’ll go home and I won’t come back until I’ve healed.” Which would be never at this rate, so she might as well consider herself unemployed. “How’s that?”
Chloe definitely caught the fact that ‘wife’ was used. She glanced at Elsa and nodded. “Definitely,” she whispered back.
“Just another week darlin’, that okay?” Logan could negotiate with that. “Can’t have you gone forever, there’s been a noticeable drop in profits since you’ve been on medical leave.”
“I wish I had some popcorn,” Elsa whispered.
“I heard that,” Logan called out.
Bo well knew she wouldn’t be healed in a week. And she knew that Logan would just send her back home again. Part of her somewhat wished that she’d stayed dead, that would’ve been easier. The other part wanted an instant healing job, but that would require her knowing what she’d been stabbed with in the first place. And Bo had a sneaking suspicion there wasn’t actually a way to instantly heal her wound.
“Yeah, fine. I’ll try not to die of boredom in the meantime.” It was supposed to be a joke.
Chloe couldn’t help but to laugh a bit at Elsa’s comment and Logan apparently having heard it.
“I really will call Lara,” Logan replied, giving Bo a look like he was really going to do it. For really reals. “Look, I know you’re losing’ your mind, god knows I would in your place. What if we put you on part time. You can come in a couple times a week for a few hours.”
A drink and a show, Elsa liked this. While they were distracted she slid Chloe her drink for a sip. Ooh. Naughty.
“I know you’ll call her,” Bo said, having already resigned herself to leaving and going back home. She probably should because her chest was hurting. She was just getting good at pretending it didn’t, which wasn’t exactly a good thing. “I’ll take whatever you want to give me.”
Chloe looked at the drink, and didn’t need another second to think about it. She just picked the glass up and took a sip before sliding it back to Elsa with a grateful little smile.
“I know its tough. Believe me, I know what it’s like to be invincible one day, an’ then lose that the next. It ain’t easy. But you’ll get through it.” He smiled at her, “I just want to look out for you.”
In another life, maybe they could have been more. Even Elsa could see some of the tension between them. She winked at Chloe and picked her drink up again.
“I guess we’ll see,” she responded. The way things were going? Bo wasn’t certain she’d actually get through it, not completely. But she’d like to at least not be in pain so much or fear that the wound to her heart would reopen at any time and she’d bleed out. Sometimes being a succubus really sucked. Especially when Bo hadn’t had sex since before she’d been stabbed and she most likely would put sex off until she was more healed.
Which...well, she just hoped there was a way to heal the wound enough where she felt comfortable enough to have sex again.
“I’ll get back home here. See you later.” Bo moved out from behind the bar and started heading off. Because of course she drove herself here.
The guy wasn’t to Chloe’s taste, but the tension between the two was palpable. With the show seemingly over, she turned around on the stool again, putting her back to the bar.
So much for sneaking more drinks to Chloe. Elsa shook her head. That was at least better than Razormaw or whatever that band had been named.
Logan squinted in Chloe’s direction. Something was familiar about her scent. He knew he’d smelled her somewhere before, but that was a conversation non-starter. However… “I’ll pretend I didn’t see you sneak her a drink.”
When the guy squinted in her direction, Chloe took it as a sign to leave. She was underage and all.
“I get it, I can leave. Don’t wanna give your place a bad rep or something,” she said to him and slid off her stool.
“Nah. Just somethin’ about you seems familiar. Long as I don’t notice you’re drinking, I don’t really care.” He just had to pretend he didn’t care. Logan might be a mentor to people but when it came to drinking, unless it was to excess it didn’t really bother him.
“..Do you want something to eat?” Elsa asked. “My treat.”
Chloe gave him a little look because she didn’t know what he meant by something about her seeming familiar, and she wasn’t sure that she wanted to know. So she just sat back down on the stool next to Elsa.
“You sure? I don’t wanna mooch.”
“It’s not mooching if it’s a gift,” Elsa pointed out. She didn’t want to eat alone, and she got the impression that Chloe shouldn’t be alone right now. Call it a gut feeling.
“Alright, I can’t say no to that.” Chloe wasn’t actually certain if she was hungry, but food sounded like a good idea. If she couldn’t drink herself stupid at the moment, maybe a food coma would do the trick.
Food ended up being chicken fingers and hot wings. It was way, way too greasy for Elsa’s normal diet but she might as well live a little. Besides, she didn’t want to chicken out now. “This is going to sound ridiculous, but why are they called Buffalo Wings?”
Right now, greasy was definitely okay with Chloe. She didn’t always eat meat, but right now? She was definitely going to. “I have no clue. I always assumed it was because they’re hot and spicy.” She shrugged a shoulder.
“I’m not sure I’ve ever associated buffalos with hot and spicy. But I spent the past 7 years in London so hot and spicy anything wasn’t too common, unless you wanted Indian food.”
Which was a different kind of heat, but it shouldn't be much different right?
“I guess just blame whoever came up with the idea in the first place. If they were still alive, I’d say ask them why.” Chloe took a bite from one of the wings. “Can’t say I’ve ever been to London. Until recently, I hadn’t really been outside of Oregon.”
Elsa nodded, “I wasn’t one to travel much. It actually shocked my parents that I chose to go to school so far away. I used to keep to myself, locked up in my room a lot of the time. I just… hadn’t expected to never see them again when I left.”
She hadn’t even come back for the funeral, which hadn’t been fair to Anna, but spilled milk etc etc.
“Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do,” Chloe said. She glanced at Elsa, reading into her statement about never seeing her parents again. “I get that, about not expecting to never see someone again.” There were a couple people in Chloe’s life that were like that.
Not wanting to get into it (drowning when their yacht sank was tragic but the word ‘yacht’ had connotations she really didn’t like), Elsa just shrugged. “Came home to a big empty house. Parents dead, my sister moved out. Sometimes it still feels haunted.”
“I’m sorry. That sounds a little creepy. The house feeling haunted, I mean.” Chloe wasn’t going to pry, she knew better than to prod dead parent issues. They could be very touchy subjects. It was a very touchy one for her, one that her car accident had exacerbated.
Lots of furniture covered in sheets had made that first week almost unbearable. Elsa had made the place feel more lived in but she was honestly considering getting a small apartment instead. Just so she didn’t get lost in her own house.
She tried one of the wings and started to cough. “Okay that’s different hot than curry!”
Chloe couldn’t help but to laugh a bit at Elsa’s reaction to the wings. “Yeah, it’s definitely a different kind of hot than curry. Take a drink and give it a little time. It’s kind of an acquired taste.”
“My mouf is on fire,” Elsa complained reaching for the glass. Sure that no one was looking, she gripped it until a thin layer of ice covered the glass and chilled the water even further, before drinking.
She chuckled a bit at how Elsa spoke. “That’s how you know it’s good. You can get them even hotter. You’d swear you were a dragon with some of them because they almost make you breathe fire.” Though she did notice that thin layer of ice cover the glass and she blinked a bit, wondering if she actually saw that or not.
The water helped a little bit, and Elsa frosted over her tongue for the next wing. It didn’t actually help as much as she’d hoped, and mostly made it so she didn’t taste the chicken, just an uncomfortable icy hot. “And people do this for fun?!”
“Some people do. I’m not typically one of those kinds of people, though.” She took a drink of her own water as she polished off a wing. “I’d never join a wing eating contest, that’s for certain. I’d rather just eat wings at my own pace.”
“I think I’ll wuss out and stick to the chicken fingers,” Elsa decided, trying to pretend like her eyes weren’t watering. “Ranch and a little bit of hot sauce is enough for me.”
“More for me then!” Chloe said as she slid the basket of wings closer to her. “I tend to eat a bit healthier than this. But right now? I don’t fucking care. It tastes good.”
“Me too. I don’t think my sister would let me live it down if she knew I was eating this stuff.” But the chicken fingers were really good. She’d have to try them more often.
“Yeah, I tend to binge sometimes. Or if I just feel like being bad.” Chloe had plenty of bad habits, why not add to them with her eating habits at times? Besides, what was the point if you didn’t indulge on foods that weren’t necessarily good for you. Of course, one might wonder where Chloe put the calories considering she was skinny.
“A little indulging won’t kill you,” Elsa decided. She smiled at Chloe. At least with the bartender gone she wasn’t falling all over herself.
Watch her find a way to stick her foot in her mouth with Chloe though.
“I know, I know, I have a bony white ass. Can’t really help that. I’ve always been skinny.” Chloe commented, glancing down at herself. She’d lost some weight in the last five years, but she’d never been overweight. If anything, her weight was probably another indicator that she was having life problems.
She sometimes worried her sister starved herself over her job, but Elsa kept that to herself. Elsa definitely had more curves than Chloe; in another life she might have been one of those femme fatales in a noir film. Only in blue instead of red.
“You look good.”
Chloe didn’t starve herself, she had a good relationship with food. Perhaps she had a high metabolism, or she just burned the calories quickly. She was infamous for getting in fights and trashing junkyards when she was angry or upset. So perhaps that was it.
“Thanks, so do you.” It was not lost on Chloe that Elsa was attractive. The other blonde just struck her as being out of her league. Then again, she’d thought Rachel was out of her league, she she supposed that such things didn’t always matter.
Color touched Elsa’s cheeks, and she picked up her drink to hide the expression on her face. “Thanks…”
She did get that a lot, but it was so much better coming from another girl.
She saw the color on Elsa’s cheeks and couldn’t help but to smile a bit. “You’re welcome,” she responded. Chloe took a drink of water, then picked up another wing to eat it.
“So, are you in school still or are you out working in the real world?”
“I’m a working stiff. I have degrees in engineering and architectural design,” Elsa answered. “I’m working with L-Corp, designing their new building!”
“Holy shit, more power to you. That’s hella awesome, though.” Clearly Elsa had ambition and a direction she wanted to go in in life. Chloe...not so much.
“I figure there are a couple of ways to make sure your legacy lives on,” Elsa replied. She ducked her head. “Kids are probably not going to be a thing, so having buildings you designed is nice.”
“That’s pretty cool, leaving your mark on the world like that. I tend to just graffiti things to leave my mark.” Chloe wanted to be remembered, but she didn’t have much in the way of building something that stood the test of time. So she’d just have to take being in someone’s memories. Providing they actually took the time to remember her, of course.
“I’ve seen some amazing street art. I’m not sure that’s the same thing as graffiti, but I’ve always found it charming.” Elsa was reminded of one particular mural near the University she’d gone to. Something like urban heroes.
“I’m not much of an artist. I tend to just write quotes on things. Every once in a while I’ll draw a picture, but I just use a sharpie. Maybe I’ll upgrade to spray paint eventually.” Chloe shrugged a shoulder.
Elsa laughed, then covered her mouth with her hand. “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that.” She wasn’t exactly going to snitch. That seemed like a rude thing to do to someone she’d just met, and tagging was generally harmless. She’d probably feel different if it was her building.
“Thanks. And if you get any of your buildings built, let me know which ones so I don’t tag them.” Or at least Chloe would try not to. Sometimes if she was mad enough she didn’t care where she was when she tagged something. So long as no one was watching her, of course!
Elsa really should let Chloe get back to her screaming or singing or whatever that was, but she didn’t know what else to do today. Her sister was busy, Weiss was also busy. She supposed she could call Rose… “I’m sorry if I ruined your plans for the day.”
“You didn’t ruin anything. The only plans I had were to try and forget shit for a while by any means necessary.” Running into Elsa was a far less drastic version of forgetting her troubles than Chloe had anticipated needing that night.
“I hope that I helped. Is there any thing else I can do?” Talking would probably be good. But she doubted that’s what Chloe would want right now.
“You did,” Chloe confirmed with a nod. And Elsa had. She’d been less focused on the crap swirling in her head since they’d bumped into each other. “I don’t know, but I don’t really know what I need these days. Screaming for a while has a certain appeal to it, though.”
“I don’t know any place where you can go to just… scream. But I can … make things that you could scream at. Or break.” Elsa glanced around, then put her hand on the bar. An ice sculpture grew in front of Chloe, like some kind of vase.
“There’s train tracks I go to and scream when trains go by. I also might hang out in junkyards as well.” Both of those tended to be in non-residential areas, so her screaming and trashing of the junkyard wouldn’t be noticed by people. Though when the ice sculpture took form in front of her, she blinked. “Holy shit,” she said as she stared at the ice vase. “I’m definitely down for breaking these things.”
“Show me where you want to go. I can call an Uber,” Elsa decided, feeling like she was doing something crazy. Maybe Chloe was just good at bringing out someone’s crazy side.
“I know just the spot.” There was a nice open area by the junkyard she frequented. They could go there. “If you don’t mind walking a little, we can have the uber drop us at a place less weird-seeming than a junkyard.” Even if she wasn’t driving, the thought of cars made Chloe a little uneasy.
Alright, more than a little uneasy. But she also had a point about not being driven right to the junkyard.
“After this meal I’m going to need a whole lot of exercise to work that off, so I really don’t mind,” Elsa assured her. She paid for the meal and then slipped off the stool and brushed her lap off.
“Cool. There’s a place where we can be dropped off and all.” Chloe finished off her water, then used a wet wipe on her hands before she slid off the stool and looked at Elsa. “Thanks again for the food.”