maskormenacelogs | [open] November Wednesdays

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[open] November Wednesdays

WHO: Mr. Wednesday, and fellow travelers.
WHERE: In Heropa, or on the road, or wherever else is needed.
WHEN: All month.
WHAT: Catch-all.
WARNINGS: A potential for gore and cynicism, and references to the mistreatment of (now rescued!) animals.

1.) The Caretaker

Most people come to the Heropa Exotic Bird Rescue see the colorful ones - parrots, macaws, toucans - a vibrantly plumed bunch partial to equally vibrant fruits. There are plenty of them, pulled from unlicensed pet stores and the homes of the not-so-wealthy-as-they'd-thought. The sight can, thus, prove more depressing than festive; you are as likely to find them tattered after months of mistreatment, packaged in a dark container aboard a ship, then confined in the home of someone with more money than sense or decency.

There are some, however, who come for the sight of savagery - not the sad, ignorant savagery of humans, but the primal, eternal savagery of nature, which has a beauty (certainly a truth) all its own.

The condor enclosure is about as big as they come, a space meant to accommodate the queens of vulture-kind. Inside, a tall, bearded man in a leather smock and heavy-duty gloves carries a skinned goat over his shoulder, an offering of raw muscle and tendons, its strange dead eyes staring sightlessly from either side of its head. The man appears unbothered by the winged shadows that start to swoop in from the upper reaches of the enclosure, moving into the center-front of the space, well within view of any visitors. Mere moments after the man drops the carcass on the ground, the great black birds converge and begin to tear off strips of flesh and press deeper for rich organ meats, their strange, naked heads fashioned by epochs of evolution for just such a purpose.

Some minutes later, the man has reappeared, smockless, gloveless and seemingly immaculate, gone from participant to observer. Had he not been seen in the cage, he'd be easy to mistake for a visitor rather than an employee, as his ever-so-slightly mismatched eyes watch the magnificent monsters in the cage feasting, an obscure hunger glimmering in one of their pale depths.

2.) The Hitcher

It's peculiar to find a hitchhiker when there are Porters available. More peculiar still that this one doesn't hold his thumb out constantly or consistently as he lopes along the side of the highway, clad in a pale suit and a long jacket. Instead, when this or that car approaches, he'll turn his head and raise his arm, thumb jutting out for a selective request.

And as often as not, he gets a ride, his success rate astounding for an older man with an air of slightly embarrassed prosperity. When his benefactors turn towards him, slowing towards stop, he turns to face them fully, fingers spreading in a broad-handed hail. Then he gets in, wearing a smile as carefully tailored as his suit, his gratitude expressed through gregariousness or reticence, depending on the tastes of the driver- tastes he is able to discern without asking. He'll go about as far as you'll take him, as long as you're headed in his direction. That direction being?

"North."

3.) The Barfly/The Wildcard

Blood and bad decisions are marks of any bar worth drinking at. And while Heropa is by and large a tidy, tightly-run ship, it still contains some bars deserving of the name. The prettiest places, after all, require the greatest concentrations of runoff ugliness; visible virtue demands vice be buried somewhere. We can either live in shit, or dig cesspools.

It's in just such a place that you meet him. Perhaps a fight has broken out, and the man with the knife-like grin offers you odds on the outcome. Perhaps you have just begun to play a game of darts, or pool, and he approaches you with a slur in his voice and a challenge on his tongue. Perhaps you are young and attractive, and have caught his eye.

What could become of this encounter? More blood? More bad decisions?

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Most people come to see the exotic birds; Ronan is not one of those people. He comes here once a month to deliver exotic rescues that the shelter in De Chima can't handle, and to pick up any that the shelter could potentially adopt out - the budgies, the little songbirds, the small lovebirds and doves.

He hasn't been in since September, though. He's barely been to work since then, this being the first time that he's managed to get himself together enough to bother. It's a wonder he still has a job, but imPort status means people are willing to overlook a lot of bullshit for the powers and the prestige, and Ronan might not care but he takes advantage of it anyway.

It's Chainsaw who spots Mr. Wednesday first. She's a raven, a good-size, and she flies over while Ronan is signing for food and signing away a toucan that looks pissed. She looks at the vultures when she lands outside the enclosure and caws.

She wants some, too.

ImPortation, immigration, and nomadism of modern American life means new faces are common enough. Wednesday's is just such a face, though with his grizzled aspect and ease of manner, 'new' is a hard adjective to make stick.

A moment's surprise as he spots Chainsaw, a bird with the temerity to be free. A quick glance confirms that no, she isn't an escapee - the lack of leg tag is a giveaway.

"Don't envy them, my dear," he says, "a free lunch is not worth the loss of the open sky. Still..."

Wednesday extends an arm, elbow crooked to form a perch, beckoning with his other hand.

"Come here. We'll see if we can't find you something."

She caws, pleased, and flies up to land on Wednesday's arm. She doesn't know him but it doesn't matter; Kerah is right around the corner and she's curious.

She's a pleasant weight, a beautiful bird, bright eyed and puzzling the new person out. She makes her way up with arm with no semblance of manners at all, her beak finding his hair, catching his ear. Her bite is not strong.

She might not have manners but she does understand this much. It's not read biting.

Wednesday does not so much as flinch as Chainsaw makes her experimental nibble. Instead he grins, forbearing her beak and remaining still, relaxed as only someone accustomed to serving as a carrion-bird perch can be.

"Usually this experience is more informative for me," he avers, "but I won't begrudge a turning of the tables."

He turns his head slowly, finding the raven's unfathomable eyes with his own pale, ever-so-slightly mismatched ones.

"Whose are you? I can take you to the kitchen for some scraps but I don't want to be pegged as a bird-thief."

Chainsaw is clever and cleverer than most ravens, and so she doesn't take much to respond. "Kerah!" she tells him, which is not a caw without meaning, but her name for Ronan, who comes ambling around the corner.

"What," he asks, and she looks at Ronan, then back at Wednesday. Ronan is a tall teenager, whip-corded and surly looking, the hooks of a black tattoo just visible at his neck and shoulders. He looks vaguely annoyed at this entire endeavor; but his shirt has the telltale snarls and snags of someone who often acts as a perch for a certain bird. "Shithead, he might be a serial killer."

He's definitely talking to Chainsaw, and he holds his arm out. She does not fly back in response, opting instead to caw out instead. "Shithead!"

It doesn't take long for Wednesday to assemble the clues and draw conclusions. He lifts a hand to hail Ronan, head tilting just a little towards the bird on his shoulder.

"Your friend," he presumes, "has a good eye for marks. Sized me up quickly enough."

Wednesday chuckles as Chainsaw echoes Ronan's profanity.

"I'd be happy to reward her audacity, if you wouldn't mind. I can get her something from our kitchen. I believe it would count as community outreach, as opposed to embezzlement."

Ronan's eyes narrow, and he looks even surlier. "She has shitty taste in friends," he says, rolling his eyes, but if this guy wants to feed Chainsaw...

"If you poison my bird I'll break every single one of your teeth, old man," he says, which is about as charming as Ronan gets, "and that's just where I'll fucking start." He figures, though, if the guy works here, he's not going to poison any bird.

Chainsaw is much more friendly than her owner - well, her maker. She caws and nips.

"A good scavenger doesn't have friends- they have opportunities," Wednesday says, sounding particularly genial when juxtaposed with Ronan's youthful rancor. He might resemble your good-hearted grandpa, were it not for the lack of warmth in those pale eyes.

"I'll take that as permission." The presumption being that a warning against poisoning would be unnecessary if he weren't going to feed Chainsaw at all. Discerning the informational content of threats is an important skill in an unsavory person's repertoire.

He begins to make his way towards the squat concrete building which houses the food-prep facilities, without so much as glancing back at Ronan. He does, however, offer:

"You can come as well, young man, if you'd like."

He's not inclined to let anyone be alone with Chainsaw, so he does follow, and remarkably he doesn't make any teenage huffing noises at the suggestion. One thing can be said about Ronan is that his bad attitude and his venom is a warning, but it isn't an act. It eases off him in a way that doesn't suggest it's something to grow out of.

He hasn't been in this side of the building.

"You're new here," he says, finally. This is not a conversation builder. This is a comment on the fact that he knows the rest of the staff.

The kitchen is a large space full of scratched steel surfaces and raw smells. The sounds of chopping echoes against cinderblocks and linoleum, making a small din out of the work of a fairly modest staff.

"Only in one sense," Wednesday replies, "you should give me deference anyways. Cleverer young men than you have made the mistake of not heeding their elders."

He leads the bird and her lad over to a preparation surface not far from the great stainless steel bulk of the meat locker. Wednesday shifts Chainsaw to his shoulder, then draws a long knife from a big wooden block and proceeds to slice strips of meat off of a carcass so well butchered as to be unrecognizable.

"Lean meat," he says, offering the sliver to Chainsaw, "I aim to treat her, not to spoil her.

"Where'd you find her? Or did she find you?"

Ronan starts to poke around the kitchen when Wednesday says that, and he snorts, unimpressed at the idea of deference to anyone, but doesn't respond to it otherwise. This isn't very interesting but it's good to know it's here, should he come here without anyone else at some point (and Ronan might just).

But at the later part of the question he considers not answering, before Chainsaw, who is watching and taking the sliver without manners, snapping fingers with it, replies with Kerah! as if to make him answer. "I raised her," Ronan finally says, settling on a half truth. It's true he raised her, but he also dreamed her, created her. There are two gods in this kitchen, one old, and one new, and both lacking in worship. The difference rests in that Ronan doesn't need it to be strong, and doesn't want it. "Don't be an asshole, shitheel."

He's most assuredly speaking to the bird, who is trying to steal a another strip of carcass.

[the kid behind the wheel looks old enough to be driving, but probably not much else. he smells like alcohol, or maybe that's just the interior of the car-- probably not reassuring if not altogether threatening anyway. there's a beer wearing a thoughtful little brown paper bag in the cupholder.

his pupils are huge in the rearview mirror as he sizes up the old man in next to him.

kavinsky is driving a murderous-looking black suv tonight. chunky, black, tinted windows. he prefers his shitty little racing cars, of course, but they don't have the cabin space to carry the crates in the back, which contain about a dozen automatic rifles. it is definitely the best possible time to be picking up hitchhikers on the side of the road to maurtia falls. he presses the gas, switches gears. in a breath, they're safely twenty over the speed limit again.] Hey. You suck dick or what?

[ If the miasma of high risk youth troubles the hitchhiker, he doesn't show it. Maybe he's a little crazy himself. He is, after all, thumbing along the highway in a time and place that has hover-cars. He's well dressed, in a storm-gray suit, and his silver-and-copper beard is well trimmed, but not all loonies are slovens.

The young man's question prompts a smile, an expression like a knife- sharp and cold. It's something he brandishes. He shakes his head. ]

I'm afraid I'm a traditionalist. Older man's prerogative. You'd have to be servicing me.

[ Wednesday reaches into his pocket and pulls out a pack of cigarettes. ]

While I appreciate the icebreaker, young man, I'm not in the market. Not for that, anyway.

[ He offers the smokes to Kavinsky. ]

[acceptable peace offering. kavinsky selects one cigarette, keeping one eye on the weird old dude and one eye on the road. he rather expects said passenger to provide him a light, although he's more than capable of steering with a knee while he digs out his smoking paraphernelia. occasionally, he will choose not to escalate even when given the option.

he pokes the cigarette out in wednesday's direction expectantly.]

Kavinsky, [he says.] I probably know a guy. Cocaine? Could help you with the paunch, man. [he smiles at the windshield, two bright rows of orthodontically perfect teeth. he probably does not smoke it.] We're heading into my town. [most people would consider maurtia falls bigger than a town, but kavinsky's accent places him from north jersey, quite squarely.] If I'm not the guy, I know a guy.

Wednesday, [ the older man replies,] Mr. Wednesday to you.

[ He extracts a cigarette for himself, setting it to dangle at the corner of his mouth and lighting the tip with a black plastic lighter. He puffs, draws and exhales a lazy plume before tossing the lighter into Kavinsky's lap. ]

I'm looking for weapons. More to the point, I'm looking for the men who use them.

[ He smokes with a no-nonsense mien which is so bereft of affectation it assumes the character of one, a signifier of the masculine as that-which-need-not-signify. One doesn't compensate when one has. One doesn't front when one simply is.

He regards Kavinsky from the corner of his eye, expression having eased into the insouciance of criminal enterprise- jailyard nonchalance. ]

Am I in luck?

[kavinsky gives the old man a sideways look, one eyebrow up. wednesday. really. wednesday. really? mr. wednesday makes the proposal sound somewhat more serious, but that isn't necessarily a good thing. he thinks about making an addams family reference, and under most circumstances he'd be irreverent enough to do it. but there's a lot of gravitas in his passenger seat, and an enormous quantity of illegal weapons in the back.

he doesn't say anything. not even, are you a cop? which had been the other option there. kavinsky almost always has something to say. anyone who knows him would probably be checking him for a fever.

instead, his skinny hand darts down to pick up the lighter. he doesn't try to light his cigarette immediately. instead, he returns his grip to the wheel, and steps his foot down on the accelerator just a little. his eyes slide out of focus very slightly, his attention stretching away from driving and into his psychometry instead. he pries into the sensory memory of the lighter. voices overhead, sights seen the last time he fired up a cigarette. he doesn't know what he expects to see: a precincthouse? sarah manning, maybe. wife and two-point-five kids.]

[ WHAT ARE THE CHANCES? one might ask. Right place, right time, right roadside, right ne'er-do-well. If he starts asking about purchasing weapons with microphone-friendly clarity while inclining his chin towards that gleaming silver lapel-pin, then the game will surely be up.

The lighter carries resonances of the mass-produced rattle-clack of its origins, upon which is overlaid the irregular snap and flare of its use. These uses are intermittent, not patterned like a chain-smoker's might be, an object of incidental use. The last time was in a bar, air redolent with old smoke and beer and just a little blood, lights dim enough for comfortable conspiracy. The sound of a dog-race plays on a radio, competing for sonic space with the rumble of Wednesday's voice - I can cut you in, but we'll need seed money...

Meanwhile, back in the present, the older man arches a single silver-streaked brow. ]

I hope you don't take this long to answer when you get pulled over.

Edited 2016-11-23 22:33 (UTC)

[promising. no guarantee, but better than what kavinsky had hoped against. his eyes blink back into focus. he arranges the smoking paraphernelia properly on his person and finally lights the cigarette, the one hand on the wheel making a few minute adjustments to straighten their course along the highway.] I don't get pulled over.

[all seventeen-year-olds are invincible, don't you know. some more than others.]

Truth is, I forgot the question. [he closes the lighter and flips it onto wednesday's lap. all casual-like.] You want guns? A man? Gigolo. [he didn't forget the question, but sometimes people volunteer more information in the process of repetition. what he's hoping for, now, as he revs the engine and dumps another ten miles per hour into the speedometer.] I do a lot of drugs. Thinky not so good. [this much is accurate.]

I see.

[ No one is quite as good at making one field old as the young. Wednesday pockets the lighter and rolls down the window to ash into the blur beyond. ]

I'm noticing a preoccupation. [ He's shifting from expansive to brusque. Some of this is funny, but the joke is wearing thin. He ceases to mince words. Criminality doesn't always demand subtlety. ]

Guns, yes. And killers. Cocks are not a requirement. [ Not in an anatomical sense, anyways. ]

I'll take a Valkyrie any day.

[taking the cigarette from his own mouth, kavinsky nods his head understandingly, without looking over. a lot of people notice the preoccupation. most people get kind of mad about it, so wednesday's cool cool chill deserves some sweet compassion in return.

he has no idea what a valkyrie is. but wednesday probably wasn't counting on that.]

Only person I ever straight-up murdered was my dad, [kavinsky says, eventually.] But I know a guy. Who owns a lot of guys. Not in a gigolo way, [he clarifies helpfully. they veer around a bend in the road and maurtia falls begins to sparkle in the distance, even before a green sign flashes by, counting down the miles.] I can introduce you. And sell you a gun before you meet him, if that'd make you feel better.

[he glances at the old man and gets the impression that it takes a fair bit for wednesday to feel bad enough to want to feel better. maybe it's an old person thing?? maybe because most of his own drug-addled reality-escapist mentally ill ilk don't tend to make it to old age.] How's that sound?

A parricide, [ and a flippant one to boot, though Wednesday's tone isn't chiding as he says ] I'd advise you not have any sons of your own. That's one of those crimes that gets back to you.

[ He takes another long, lazy drag and blows the smoke out the window before rolling it up again, quieting the howl. ]

I think we're in business. If you are as good as your word, I'm sure we can work out a finder's fee.

[ No mention of needing a gun. He may already be packing. Or he may just be confident. Or crazy. He might be all three. This is the trouble with people you pick up on the side of the highway.

A sidelong look. ]

Did he deserve it? [ is asked with an insouciance that is mutually exclusive with judgement. ]

[kavinsky's quiet for a moment. the mitsubishi talks for him, growling over pavement. and then his eyebrows go up, and he turns toward the old man in the chair, offering him a fist-bump, which will end up on wednesday's bicep if he doesn't know what to do.] Appreciate the advice, man. And the business. Gonna keep that shit in mind.

You mean my dad?

[the city lights get brighter. they see their first billboard about well-endowed ladies and discount drinks, a personal injury one after that. heater repair by a reputable hvac service. somebody's flying a hot air balloon in the distance. signs of civilization for you, right there. kavinsky creeps the car over a few lines, looking for a likely exit.] Hell yeah. Total piece of shit. You got kids?

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[open] November Wednesdays

1;

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2; (cw underage drinking and driving, drug use, inappropriate sexual remark, etc.)

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lmk if you need the psychometry writeup, but it's pretty typical

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