Raksha "Hellcat" O'Dubhshlaine (iamthehellcat) wrote in willowbrookrpg, @ 2013-12-04 11:08:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | day: october 11, player: megh, raksha kurosawa |
[Syn] - Backdated
Who: Raksha and Tahmoh
When: Friday, 10/11 following/prompted by this
Where: Seagram, then around the city
What: Adventure time in the urban jungle
Rating: TBA
Status: Incomplete/Closed
Usually, Tahmoh was content with spending the night in, relaxing. The texts though left him intrigued. He definitely didn’t mind going on the town, and at this point trusted Raksha to find something fun to pass the time. To be honest, ever since Anne went away on a mission, he’s been feeling just a bit more restless as he always did when feeling a bit nervous about his big sister. So the texts were welcome, and the response was quick for a reason.
He was waiting for Raksha in the lobby, as he promised, dressed in black jeans and a light jacket over a long sleeve shirt. He wasn’t sure what they were going to end up doing, but putting this on, just made sure that he was going to be comfortable no matter what. And that was great.
Raksha hadn’t quite decided what he wanted to do, just that he wanted to be out and moving. Long-sleeved gray shirt that was actually intended for working out with its moisture-wick fabric and his customary black cargos. It was cool enough to put the leather jacket over top and combat boots completed the look. The tattoos were all hidden, the only body mods to show were the multiple ear piercings. He took the elevator partway down, then finished the distance on the stairs once well into the non-Syndicate floors. He liked the feel of muscles working, the beginning rush of adrenaline. It was his drug of choice.
Soft-footed even in the boots, he stepped into the lobby. Golden eyes scanned the room, quickly picking out the figure familiar of Tahmoh waiting. The other male was one of the very few that Raksha had established any true level of trust for, though no one at Syn had the level he reserved for Aidrian. That was something Tahmoh understood and made him one of the few who knew Raksha had any family at all. With a slightly cheshire cat grin, Raksha approached his friend, “Hey.”
At one point, you have to trust someone. Even when he was in foster care, he had to find someone (and sometimes the wrong someone) to trust. Sometimes he got burned (someone he loved who reported him to a mental institution after Tahmoh told him of the powers), sometimes he got rewarded (someone once saved him from being arrested). On a mission, you trusted. So Raksha was someone he trusted. And even when sometimes clubbing trips ended up in a bad one night stand, at least they were open enough to tell each other about them, and warn the other about the bad apples. With humor, of course.
Tahmoh pushed himself off the wall, and smiled at his … friend. They were kind of friends, right? “Hey.” He looked over, quickly thinking what he was wearing. “I think we thought along the same lines. So, where to? I say outside.” He paused, and then dropped his voice slightly. “You okay?” It was a way to ask, just in case the other man wanted to talk.
“Seems like,” Raksha commented, having noticed the similarity himself. “Definitely outside, fresh air sounds good.” He didn’t have any preference for where to go as long they were moving. Even as he spoke, his gaze was sweeping the lobby and checking for threats out of long time habit. Muscles held a relaxed tension, ready to move in whatever way possible with far more voluntary control than most.
“Sure, good enough.” It wasn’t much of an answer. Rarely was he forthcoming, both out of a natural inclination of privacy and learned avoidance of weakness. Both Izzy and Aidrian had had to corner him to get inside his head. Now wasn’t one of the times he was willing to share. “You hungry?”
Tahmoh gave up trying to push his way in. He wasn’t good at it, and he wasn’t sure he could handle some of the baggage -- or was the guy for the job, at least currently. he could provide escapes, and was a master of finding it on his own. So he shrugged, and moved towards the exit, stepping into the cool autumn air.
“I can be. You know how it goes: put food in front of me and I’ll eat it. One day my metabolism will catch up with me.” He sighed and looked around. “What are you in the mood for? There’s a part of me that wants to turn this city into our very own jungle gym, but probably not right in the middle of the city. Hudson park, maybe?”
Raksha grinned with Cheshire cat wickedness at the suggestion, “Park then food?” Urban jungle or regular jungle, he enjoyed prowling either one. He followed Tahmoh out into the autumn air, senses perking up. A nudge at the edges of his awareness as a stray cat passed them, its fur puffing slightly as it smelled the tiger in Raksha’s scent.
“I’ll eat pretty much anything. I get weird looks if I eat enough to satisfy my metabolism in public.” Being a shifter and who knew what other factors meant his body burned calories at a rapid rate and required a high intake, preferably heavy in protein. The tiger in him influenced everything, at least a little. Though borrowing other animal traits would temporarily affect his diet as well.
”You’d never hear me complain about food or activities,” Tahmoh returned the grin, taking a deep breath of city air. It wasn’t Canada, it wasn’t the forest, or the pond where he played hockey, but it’d do. He looked down at the cat, rolling his eyes. He thought of getting a pet, something that ground him here, especially now that Anne was anywhere but here. It was harder to find reasons to stay sometime.
He started heading across the avenue, going towards the river. Hudson Park was close enough -- a mile or two, and Tahmoh really could be there in minutes -- but this was not the time to start running through the streets of Manhattan. It wasn’t late enough yet. In the park though, it would be just homeless, and no one would really believe their ramblings. “You know, there’s always takeout.” He shrugged. “Cause there’s a place on Broadway for good late night chinese, and then sprint over to Riverside park. Enjoy the chill night air with some spicy food.” He paused, and realized that that was something else, a basic factoid, he didn’t know about Raksha. “What’s your favorite type of food? Other than a lot?”
“Sounds good,” Raksha moved easily along with Tahmoh toward the river. Golden eyes continued to scan surroundings, watching for any threat. Mostly people ignored them, giving way without a closer look their way. He hadn’t bothered to change his eyes, not caring if people noticed the glimmer of eyeshine in the darkness. Night time was his favorite time to be outside, it felt like there were less masks to wear. Not that he made too much of an effort to wear a human mask to begin with. Aidrian had always been better at being “normal”. A few gave him wary looks, noting the piercings and perhaps picking up on the predator beneath the skin.
“Guess I don’t really have one,” he paused, considering. Food was food for the most part. He wasn’t much of a cook either. “Learned not to be picky.” Hunger had started to make itself known, it’d be been a few hours since he’d eaten last. Those calories long since burned off with a few rounds of shadowboxing in the spare room in his suite. “What ‘bout you?”
Tahmoh could blend in easily enough, but he didn’t want to. He gave up on trying to be normal a while ago. He didn’t even blink twice at Raksha’s eyes; he was used to it. And who knows? Park was a good place to run around in the fresh air, and let it go. “No? Really?” He shrugged a bit. “I used to just want food. Beggars can’t be choosers and all that.” He paused and then added. “There’s something to be said for a nice steak. But I like spicy food, so some authentic Thai almost always hits the spot.” He paused and shrugged. “Any random questions for me?” It seemed that they were walking, might as well talk. It seemed normal, but not in a bad way.
“Aye, doesn’t matter much when you’re hungry and don’t know when the next meal is coming.” He moved easily alongside Tahmoh, being out in the dark was energizing yet comfortable. Every sense was alert, what bare skin there was (hands and face primarily) nearly as sensitive as a cat’s whiskers to the air currents and such around them. He nodded in agreement about the steak. The bloodier the better in his opinion. “Thai is good, I’m always up for green curry.”
As they continued, he let his senses stretch out, first sweeping with the odynokinesis to catch flickers of pain here and there. The aches and pains of daily life, the sharper sting of injuries from papercuts to more serious. He’d honed the gift over the years since it manifested to be as precise as he could. He picked up on the city animals, rats and stray cats. The occasional pigeon. The park had more, crows and owls, rabbits and raccoons. Considered for a moment, “D’ya ever wish you weren’t a mutant?”
”True on that part, but … it’d be nice sometimes to just have the sureness of food. And I know at least currently I have control over that, which is nice.” Part of him was thinking how much faster they could have gotten to the park if he just ran them there. But that’ll come later. Maybe. “Green? There’s part of me that likes to inflict the pain of jungle curry on myself, but that’s because Anne says I don’t like having taste buds for very long.”
They hit the park after a while and he breathed in the water and the trees -- the things that were missing in the center of the city. he made a face a bit, as he stretched and let his back crack. “Sometimes. I think it’d be easier. But then I think that I’d get bored of being ‘normal’. I enjoy my abilities but…” He gave a bit of a sad smile. “It’d be easier to connect to people if we weren’t what we are.” He shrugged. “What about you?”
“Nah,” he shrugged, memories flickering at the edges of his mind, “Hell, I don’t remember what it was like to not be.” Barely more than a year old. Not that he made the effort to remember his childhood, such that it was. Quiet for a moment, thoughts circling each other like feral dogs looking for weaknesses. Then a headshake accompanied by a self-deprecating smile, “It’s not my abilities that tend to drive people away.”
It wasn’t, not always. Raksha knew the intense, mercurial nature of his personality was hard on people. He didn’t try to please anyone for the most part or follow social norms. He wasn’t nice. Too wild, too difficult. Too something to handle. Mutation added to it, but he was too self-aware to pretend it was the only reason or even the main one. Not that he wanted to connect to very many people in the first place.