(no subject)

[lazyandincompetent]

Nathan has decided this place isn't half bad.

Exhibit A: His flat. No more crashing in the community centre, curled up in a shitty sleeping bag on the cold floor. Instead he's got a bed. In an actual bedroom. And it isn't just a mattress on the floor either, he's got a proper bedframe and a headboard and even a little bedside table where he throws his cigarettes and his weed and his lighter after a long day. There's a living room with a proper couch, a kitchen, and his bathroom doesn't have a single stall door in the whole thing. If he wants a shower, he can draw a curtain. True privacy.

Exhibit B: Weed is legal. Weed is legal. He's cheerily smoking a pre-rolled joint now, right out in the middle of the sidewalk where anyone can see, and no one is going to stop him or try to arrest him. Not for this, anyway, and Nathan takes a nice, big hit, then lets out a contented sigh. He's spent the better part of the last week and a bit mostly stoned, as soon as he rounded the corner from his flat during an exploration day just after his arrival and found a dispensary just staring at him. He wonders if he can work there. Talk about a dream job.

Exhibit C: Everyone is pretty friendly, including a very pretty woman in his building. She looks kind of old timey, with long pale hair and a proper high necked nightgown, but Nathan can dig it. They haven't really talked any, but he can see it in her eyes. She's interested.

There are probably other exhibits, other things that make this place better than Wertham, and maybe Nathan misses Kelly, maybe he even misses Simon a little, but this is still better. A flat and weed. That's all he needs. The money helps, too, although he's blown most of this month's cash on said weed and a lot of food and also a really nice record player and a pair of expensive wireless (wireless!) headphones for his new phone, which holds way more music than his iPod ever did.

He's got those headphones on now as he walks, smoking his joint, listening to Soundgarden as loud as he possibly can, when he's stopped by someone. A young guy waves at him, trying to get his attention, and Nathan pauses his music, then pulls down his headphones.

"Yeah?" he asks.

"Do you know where High Gate Terrace is?" the guy asks. "I'm supposed to meet someone there."

"Nah, sorry, mate," Nathan answers, then gestures with one hand, indicating the city at large. "I just got here. New to this whole thing. I don't even know where I live half the time."

"No," the guy mutters. "No, this isn't right. I have to be there."

"You're not about to have a mental breakdown are you?" Nathan asks, only partly wary. The rest of him is downright interested. "Just snap and go completely fucking mad? 'Cause that'd be fun to watch."

[Nathan is talking to a ghost, but doesn't know it, because he doesn't know he has that ability yet. :D]

Comments

[quickestgirl]

Marianne has been at Barton for the morning and is heading back towards her apartment, thinking of getting lunch or something on her way there when she says Nathan on the pavement up ahead of her. She waves her hand to wave, and then he realises that he's talking. To thin air. Mariane's pretty used to Darrow weirdness, so it doesn't throw her as much as it might have back in Dublin.

"Hi," she says, slowing to a halt. "Alright?"

[lazyandincompetent]

"D'you know where High Gate Terrace is?" Nathan asks Marianne, then jerks his thumb over his shoulder to indicate the guy still muttering to himself. "This mad fucker is asking me and I think he might blow a gasket if someone doesn't tell him soon."

It kind of makes him miss Simon a little more. This would be the sort of thing he would record on his phone and make a whole video of so they could watch it later and laugh about the whole thing.

Well, Nathan would laugh. Simon would just get pissed Nathan had grabbed his phone.

[quickestgirl]

"I...don't." Marianne's eyebrows raise slightly, and she blinks. "I...Nathan? Are you...feeling okay? There's no-one there."

[lazyandincompetent]

"What?" he asks, turning to look at the guy again and then he lets out a scream. A very manly scream, not a shriek, not even close to a shriek, he will stand by that until the day he dies. Again.

The guy he was talking to is still standing there, but now he's got blood running down one side of his face and he's very clearly fucking dead.

"It's too late," he's muttering. "I was too late. They got me."

"Are you fucked?" Nathan asks, mostly up at the sky. "He's a bloody ghost?"

[quickestgirl]

In Dublin, Marianne might have panicked, but she hasn't been in Dublin for a while, and she's seen weirder things within Darrow's City Limits. She stands her ground, her arms folded across her chest.

"Whatever it is," she says, her voice pitched soft because Nathan is definitely agitated enough. "I can't see it."

[lazyandincompetent]

"Consider yourself lucky," Nathan says honestly, then leans close to the guy. "Are you dead, mate? Are you a fuckin' ghost?"

The guy just disappears, which tells Nathan pretty much everything he needs to know, he figures, and he sighs, rolling his eyes skyward again. Not that he believes in god, he's pretty sure that whole thing is a load of bullshit, too, but he's not sure who else to blame for the magical lightning that struck him, made him immortal, and also made him see ghosts, apparently.

"Well, that's new," he says to Marianne. "And a power I could do without. I wonder if I can get a refund on that one."

[quickestgirl]

Nathan had mentioned how he'd ended up in a coffin before, and Marianne shrugs. She's not got any powers to speak of, have she? She's always felt completely unremarkable.

"Maybe. Don't know who you'd talk to, though. You know - whether they've got an email address or anything."

[lazyandincompetent]

"Yeah, what would their address be? Giant lightning storm at hotmail?" he asks, then shrugs, because it doesn't matter. Maybe if he gives away one, he'll have to give away both, and he definitely wants to keep the immortality. He can see how that one would be useful.

Seeing ghosts might be D-list power bullshit, but immortality is definitely on the A-list.

"Hi," he says, as if finally realizing he ought to actually greet her. He holds the joint out. "Want some? This shit is legal here."

[quickestgirl]

"Hi." Marianne considers the offer for a moment. It's been a while since she smoked anything, and she knows that Sam probably wouldn't approve, but that doesn't mean that she has to tell him. After a second, she reaches out and takes the joint from Nathan, flashing him a grin. "Thanks," she says, and slips it between her lips.

[lazyandincompetent]

God, she's pretty. Like, proper pretty, too, like Ruth had been, but not secretly old. At least, he hopes not secretly old. That would be just his luck, wouldn't it, to meet a properly pretty girl and have her be an old woman again.

"He disappeared," he tells her. "The dead guy. Just so you know he's not lurking around here being a pervert or anything like that."

[quickestgirl]

"Thank God for that," says Marianne, holding the smoke for a moment before she turns her head and lets it go in a long, pale plume. She takes another quick hit before she offers the joint back to Nathan. "How are you settling in, anyway?"

[lazyandincompetent]

"Weed is legal, I have a flat instead of squatting in the community centre, this place gives me money," he says, listing off all the things about Darrow he likes as he takes the joint back.

"Everyone is really pretty," he adds. "Much prettier than Wertham. And there's a guy who looks like me. Old, though. Long hair, a goatee."

[quickestgirl]

"Klaus," says Marianne, a flicker of a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. "We met. Under the mistletoe around Christmas, up at Kagura." She nods, though, brushing her fringe out of her eyes - she needs a haircut. "It's not so bad, once you're used to it."

[diabolicalcunt]

Lucky for the ghost that Butcher can't hear, High Gate Terrace is right here. It's the place Billy has called home for more than a couple months. However reluctantly, he will admit that he has a certain fondness for the place. It's a right side nicer than Ocean View. Why the place he found was fully furnished, he will never know. The first month or so he was half-waiting for someone to come back from whatever a Darrowean might consider a vacation and try and relocate him. It never happened. Pity, that.

He misses violence, not because it's easy, even though it is. MM and Frenchie talk about it like it isn't. They even posited there was a time that Butcher found it difficult to do harm himself. They were wrong. He learned early on that there is little to no difference between protection and destruction.

Those aren't really the stakes he's living at anymore. Sometimes there are ice bees, other times the best the place has got is a slow-moving meteor that doesn't happen. Even on the streets it's a slow fuckin' news day. There's a car alarm going off a block over that people are yelling about in the dumbest feedback loop of noise Butcher has ever heard and that includes the bloody Spice Girls.

On the other side there is - upon inspection from over his shades - a bloke having a very casual conversation with no one around. It's fascinating. After a few moments of observing this painfully New York experience, he decided to do a thing he was much less likely to do in New York: engage.

"Oi!" Butcher calls to this twiggy lad, making his way a bit closer. He looks oddly familiar. "Heard you're new here. Welcome to the neighborhood. Hate to break it to you, lad, think it's you havin' a breakdown."

[lazyandincompetent]

At the sound of another voice, Nathan turns, joint stuck between his lips, his eyebrows raised. The approaching guy is big, but not that much taller than Nathan, and it's not like he has an ounce of proper fear anyway, so he just stands there.

"Yeah?" he asks, then lifts his hand to tug the joint free, blowing smoke into the air as the guy behind him mutters and rubs at his temples, then begins to tug at his hair. "I dunno, mate, he's the one who keeps muttering about... wait just a tick."

Nathan listens and then nods and says, "Yeah, he says he'll die if he doesn't get to High Gate Terrace because he owes them money and fuck this, I don't want t'get involved with some bullshit drug ring."

[diabolicalcunt]

Holy shit. This kid bears a remarkable resemblance to Klaus. This one might be close to half his age and his country of origin is clearer, but the hair, the face, the Slenderman limbs, down to the lad's height. Fucking eerie. Klaus hasn't told Butcher what his powers are. Maybe it's... this. Whatever the fuck this is. The lad doesn't seem to recognize him. Maybe that's part of it. Amnesia or Klaus just being a shite because he's Klaus.

Not much of this makes it to his expression. There's plenty enough that's amusing about this encounter without the doppelgänger element.

"Sure. Fuck 'im," Butcher agrees, arms crossed over his chest, amusement pressing deeper into his face. "Should be easy enough to walk away. Ain't much fight in a lad that don't exist."

[lazyandincompetent]

"Who the fuck said anything about fighting anyone?" Nathan asks, staring at this big guy with an incredulous expression. "Do I look like the sort t'want to ruin this beautiful face? No thank you."

He rounds on the guy who apparently doesn't exist, according to Gigantor the Smirky over there, about to tell him to fuck off, but instead he lets out a startled shriek. Because the guy is still there, but now there's blood running down the side of his face and he is very clearly a dead man.

"Didn't make it," he says to Nathan. "Didn't make it in time. You have to help me."

"Jesus Christ, a fuckin' ghost?" he asks, then turns back to Smirky McBeardFace. "This is fuckin' dumb, I don't want this power. You know anything about giving powers back, mate? Immortality is one thing, but seeing ghosts? That's some D-level bullshit, you ask me."

[diabolicalcunt]

Butcher fully rolls his eyes. There's a vague fondness to it, but that's more the face and the lad's opinion of the face than the lad himself. He doesn't know this little fucker and maybe he doesn't care to, but he's inserted himself in this situation and he must bear the consequences.

At the very least, it's amusing to watch the bloke be startled and dissatisfied by nothing. It reminds him of the time Hughie blew an invisible cunt to pieces. Those were the good old days, when he could chop a Supe up without feeling shitty about it. Being a - what did Starlight call him? A bigot? That was easier than having to scrounge for shitty jobs to keep him busy. It might look like ambition, but it's restlessness at best.

Hearing the lad's immortal isn't a huge surprise - most Supes where he comes from are. Hearing that he may have new powers is at least intriguing. He can work with that. A lot better than he can work with the time he refused $20 from a co-ed that needed a fridge moved up 3 flights of stairs.

"Don't know what your powers are, do ya?" Butcher asks, somehow managing to look both doubtful and interested. "How's that work?"

[lazyandincompetent]

"Well, it's not like they come with a bloody manual, do they?" Nathan asks, staring at the guy as he takes another hit off his joint. Right now, given everything, he doesn't think he wants to share. "Just, boom, hit by lightning, by the way now you can read someone's thoughts or you can turn back time or turn invisible. Took me dying to work out what mine was and now I've got two."

Behind him, the ghost continues to mutter and Nathan heaves a sigh.

"Fuck off, will you?" he asks, turning to the ghost. "I'm not starting up some therapy office for ghosts and all their unfinished business. You can find someone who cares about whatever the hell you are."

[diabolicalcunt]

It's truly fascinating, how everyone gets their powers differently. The more he thinks about it, the more it makes sense why Supes where he's from are the way they are. Holding onto that bias serves only as a comfort. This one's definitely a cunt, but maybe not in the Vought way. Not wanting to help a ghost isn't quite the same as, say, felling an entire plane of innocents for press interest.

"I dunno, lad. Might be missin' out on a prime business opportunity," Butcher posits. "Ghost therapist is shite. Solvin' cold cases like a genius. Tell me that ain't got some kinda ring to it." Was this the premise of a TV show? Probably. Butcher's got staying busy on the brain.

[lazyandincompetent]

"Seems like work," Nathan answers. "Hey, I've got an idea. I talk to the ghosts and you do the work."

That honestly sounds kind of boring, too. He's not sure talking to ghosts is ever going to be exciting, not even if they were murdered. Well, maybe if they were murdered. But Nathan's not a snitch and if this grizzly bear masquerading as a man wants to start snitching, that's up to him.

He can suffer the broken knees or whatever comes along with being a snitch. Nathan might be immortal, but he doesn't think his body is just going to heal if someone shoots him in the kneecap.

[diabolicalcunt]

"Well, ain't you a ray of sunshine," Butcher appraises, smirking shittily.

As he'd said a moment ago, that doesn't sound half bad as a business, and it's definitely better than getting too pissed to see every night and waking up a noon to try and figure out what the fuck to do all over again.

Judging by literally everything about this interaction, he's sure Irish Countryside Klaus would not agree.

"Immortality's a hell of a power. How many times you reckon you come back?"

[lazyandincompetent]

"I dunno, I've only died the once, but it was a spectacular death," Nathan says, shoving the joint between his lips so he can use his hands to gesture and explain what happened.

"Slipped off the roof of the community centre, right?" One hand goes up in the air, then he drives it down toward the ground with a whistle, indicating his fall. His other hand, he sticks straight up, fingers like spikes. One hand slams into the other, fingers of one hand driving through the fingers of the other. "Bam. Right onto a fence. Impaled. Blood everywhere, I'm assuming, I dunno, I was fuckin' dead."

He unhooks his hands, takes a drag from the joint and blows smoke into the air again.

"When I woke up again, I was in my coffin. Stuck there for hours! I nearly killed the battery in my iPod listening to music, because who the hell is gonna hear me banging away from underground?"

[diabolicalcunt]

"So you don't really know you're immortal," Butcher reasons. "All you know is you died and come back. Loads'a human interest stories 'bout wakin' up in graves. Really, lad, not very impressive. Maybe you're an unlucky fuck can take to dead people."

He takes a step forward, his half-grin spreading. "'Course if you wanna test my theory, I'd be more'n happy to assist."

Good murder is hard to come by and it seems to make people so angry. If this kid wants to prove to one or both of them that he's got a better power than chatting up dead blokes, he's in a position to assist. If he's wrong, that won't really matter to Butcher much, either.

[lazyandincompetent]

"Loads of human interest stories about people who die and then come back to life," Nathan echoes, looking at Grizzly Adams with an arched eyebrow. "You read some weird fuckin' human interest stories, I gotta say."

His joint is just about finished, which sucks, because then he'll have to focus on this conversation and he's fairly certain it isn't going to keep his interest. At least, that's what he thinks until the guy offers to kill him.

"Is there something wrong with you? Like, in your brain?" he asks, backing away a few steps. He's not scared, exactly, because of the whole immortality thing, but he also doesn't want to get killed by this bearded fuck in the middle of the street. "Because I'm a fuck-up and even I know going around and offering to kill strangers is really bloody psycho. Is that it? Escaped from one of those rooms with the bars on the windows and all the padding on the walls?"