poly_chromatic | ♦♦ 30TH CONTRACT - ANONYMOUS TEXT/ ACTION

Entry tags:

darker than black - hei

♦♦ 30TH CONTRACT - ANONYMOUS TEXT/ ACTION

Dear City, Has anyone ever wondered about the ridiculous choices available in condoms? Or what they mean? If you buy ribbed condoms, exactly who is that for? And what does it say to your partner? Those bumps are so small, you can hardly feel them with your fingertips. I doubt someone's orifices will notice the difference. What, then, is the subtext? That your junk lacks the requisites they find satisfying? 'So, I got ribbed condoms because my dick lacks flair. Or maybe flare.' That doesn't bode well. And what's with the coloured ones? Those in green -- do they make you fantasize about comic book heroes? Or does the idea of a green schlong make you think of gangrene and that they'll probably have to amputate? The yellow ones. Hepatic dysfunction comes to mind. I have no idea what to say about the blue numbers, except I doubt anyone's enjoying it. Tissue hypoxia does it for no-one. The reds just make me think of elongated clown noses. Those are creepy enough on a clown. You don't need them between anyone's legs. And black. I wish I knew what to say about black. Once you roll them on, they don't exactly look black. More like a dull grey, which reminds me of zombies. If you ride too hard, will it fall off? Then there's the brandnames. Durex has an intimidating 'dure' message that says: you'd better go for hours and like it. Trojans disturb me for several reasons. No one enjoys the 'Trojan Horse' implications. Hung like a horse might be a compliment, but fatal surprises aren't. Lifestyle makes you think of underhanded marketing strategies. All I feel for them is postmodern despair. Bravo seems like you're congratulating someone before the show's even started. In most of Asia, the popular brand is OK, which is equally anti-climactic. I guess it's just OK for them. Lastly, there's the issue of the amount of condoms. I've wondered about it for a long time. Is a 12-pack too desperate? Does it signify overachievement? Then again, the 5-pack seems a little condescending. Like you've got valid reasons to lower expectations. And just 1 condom? Don't get me started. Sure, choice and variety are liberating. But is it worth the angst?
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[ ooc: No, Hei hasn't lost his mind. However the senseless post has a coded message for Pai. ((Earday Arflowerstay, odecay Green Yellow Blue. Outway of ellcay. Imway OK. at st 151. In other words: Dear Starflower, code Green Yellow Blue (re: All Clear). Out of cell. I'm OK. At street 151.)) Blue highlights not ic, but can be if you'd like to go that route for funsies! Replies will be anonymous and untraceable! also, backtagging will be mighty, since I am a slow hiatusaurus<3 ]

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You're an idiot.

[Pai has been sitting in the waiting room of the prison since before the crack of dawn, waiting for him to be released. This complicated coded message? So unnecessary.]

[ It depends on your priorities. Hei's seen Anonymous' notes on the City. He's experienced their benign treatment of prisoners. But that doesn't mean he trusts them. He'd left the street number in the message obvious for a reason. He doubts they'd bother to put anyone in position quickly enough to spy on him there. Even if they wanted to, they wouldn't know quite when Hei was planning to meet Pai. And even if they guessed right, street 151 was near a shopping mall, with all its crowds and obscurity -- easy for two Contractors to fade into. Still, Hei hasn't survived this long by taking anything for granted, and the first thing he wants to do is make sure he's clean. That's the purpose of the message: a diversion within a diversion. ]

[ They've already clapped a tracking bracelet on his wrist. But that doesn't mean they've eschewed additional security measures. It might seem paranoid and obsessive. But he prefers to be sure. ]

[ Stepping into the office, the fluorescent lights, reflecting off the tiled floor, make him narrow his eyes. The cops at his shoulders, two stern, bearded man, direct Hei to the desk for token paperwork. When they're done, Hei stalks right by them without a glance, following his nose to the warm curl of coffee in the waiting room. There, Pai's presence -- her snappy greeting -- has the same effect on him as the coffee scent. In a blink, the weariness fades. He offers her a half-smile, ]

Sometimes. But I'm told it's not contagious.

[She slips her network device away and goes over to take his hand.]

I'm more worried it's genetic. [She makes a little face at him before leaning her head against his shoulder. Somewhere in the room, a man makes a noise about what a cute couple they are. Disgusting, but he's hardly the first person to think that of the two of them. Pai certainly doesn't help matters with the way she's dressed (specially chosen because it was an outfit he bought for her), and how she clings to him.]

[ Hei ignores the simpering smiles from onlookers. By now, he's used to the egregious errors people make, at how they coo at him and Pai for being such a cutsey pair of lovebirds. (Yet what other assumption can there be? He and Pai touch almost all the time. Watching movies, he lets her head rest against his shoulder. They hold hands at the restaurant table, in the streets, during shopping trips. To anyone else, it might seem clingy and inappropriately close. But when you've shared everything from death to disaster to moral degradation, all those polite barriers instilled by society tend to shiver away. Tactile reassurances are one of the few things you trust.) ]

[ His expression softens as he gathers her in -- all summery and girlish with that fluttery dress that falls in folds of pale linen around her legs. It reminds him vaguely of the white dress she'd had on when they were children. Right before the sky collapsed around them and everything happy or carefree was interminably erased from their vocabularies. He doesn't expect that innocence to return. But there are few enough reminders of his past that don't leave him chilly inside. Pai, beaming in a peppermint-white dress? Definitely one of them. ]

In that case, blame our parents. Isn't that what most children do?

I don't know. [She hasn't exactly known many children, brother. But that line of thinking will only make him sad, so she tugs him to the door.]

Come on. Let's go home.

[ He isn't quite leaning toward that train-of-thought, or else it would make him pause for a heartbeat. Instead he lets her steer him out. She says the word home, and he wonders if it's deliberate. Neither of them have had that before; permanence or security or harmless little reminders of something tangible to return to, a place to shed the armor and drop the masks. It's a dangerous thing to get used to. Especially in their world. Places are places; things are things; all that matters is their situational usefulness. It should be more important than any sense of home ever will be. ]

[ Should be. ]

[ He doesn't mention that, though. Just falls into step beside her, fingers loosely linked with hers. ]

Do I want to know how messy the apartment is?

[ It's a dry tease, mostly because Pai cleans up after herself better than most teenagers do. Still, she hasn't inherited Hei's almost spartan sense of neatness. ]

[She could tell him the truth, that she made sure to clean the place extra thoroughly for his return, because she had nothing better to do. But. Come on. He's her brother.]

Maybe you should have left me with a maid, not a babysitter.

[ He strides with Pai through the heavy doors of the Police Station. Is a little surprised, as he steps onto the pavement, at how bright the day is. His mood picks up considerably when the sun touches his bare hands and face, and brings with it a heady sense of freedom. Apart from the stupid tracking bracelet, he's relatively footloose in the stupid city, unfettered again. Pai at his side, time on his hands. The light is bright and intense, the air humid, and Hei feels the edges of his lips curling like the ends of his hair, as he focuses on her, ]

There's no guarantee she wouldn't accidentally set the apartment's booby traps off.

Well that's what you get for setting so many. [It's not that she doesn't understand her brother's paranoia.... it just strikes her as excessive. This isn't a warzone, and neither of them are weak. To her, the traps seem like more of an inconvenience than they're worth.]

[ It might seem excessive to her. But she wasn't there when Korra and Chekov slipped into the last apartment and dismantled the security systems -- before gluing his furniture to the ceiling. The memory should have a twinkle of nostalgic humor. But the repercussions of that night still send a prickle of disgust down Hei's spine. He keeps his eyes on Pai, as the sun flows in on both of them, making them glow like light-bulbs. It's almost too bright for comfort, but he squints and does not turn away. ]

I had reasons to increase the security at the new place. [ A pause, before he admits, his tone halting as if the words are caught in his throat, ] There was a ... break-in during a curse, several months ago.

[She leans against him comfortingly, squeezing his hand tight.]

What happened?

[ Now he does glance away, hitching his shoulder in a mild shrug that doesn't quite match the inflectionless quality of his voice. ]

Korra and Chekov were cursed with [ ridiculous ] superpowers. So they broke into my flat and glued all my things to the ceiling. [ One beat, then two, before he sums up, ] I responded to this by wrecking the bar Korra worked at, stringing Pavel up to a pole, and possibly chipping one of Korra's teeth. [ There were other disasters that transpired that night too. But he has no intention of getting into them. He's done his share of ugly things in Pai's presence -- but those were all centered on keeping her safe. Paradoxically, the one thing that had stopped him that night ... was Pai's memory. ]

[She hears what he isn't saying -- regrets so deep he can't give them voice, even to the person he trusts the most.]

They were stupid. [Why would they want to glue things to Hei's ceiling anyway? What do superpowers have to do with complete idiocy?]

[ Hei still isn't sure why the recollection of that night jars him so much. Morally, he's committed more heinous crimes. He's been trained to look monsters in the eye and to hold his stomach when he kisses them. But somehow, he'd always hoped he could maintain a middle-ground -- to hover between the 'good' Citizens whom he didn't belong with, and the wicked skells who could absorb and perfect the beast in him unless he held himself apart. ]

[ That night, like the weekend he was cursed to go on a killing spree, were reminders that the beast was seething and alive in him all along -- depraved and wild and unstoppable after years in its filthy cage. ]

[ Eyes dipping, he squeezes Pai's hand. ] They were. [ He won't make excuses or say it comes with their age. But that doesn't mean he'll excuse himself either. In a different tone, he asks, ] So what did you get up to, while I was away?

Oh, nothing much. I redecorated the apartment, had some boys over...

[Teasing, teasing. But a stranger listening wouldn't be able to tell.]

Hm. I should redecorate again. This time with their severed heads at the doorway, [ is his reply, serious yet oh-so-droll, because. Come on. He knows Pai better than that. He steers them to a brief stop at the open facade of a cafe, to buy two wrapped sweet-buns for them both, while over the speakers that familiar penetrating tenor sings: Be-elzebub has a devil put aside for me-e-e ... for me-e-e ... for meeeeeeee! -- the pitch spiking show-offishly to soprano without any loss of volume. Hei represses a twitch of irritation. The drunken prisoner in the neighbouring cell was belting out Queen songs all night. He could do without the repetition. ]

[ Unwrapping his bun, he takes a big bite of the soft fragrant bread, before glancing at her. ]
No one else bothered you, did they?

Of course not. [She would have killed anyone who did.]

[ Hei's lips twitch around a second bite on his snack. That's my girl. Passing his free arm around her, he feels a cool perplexing rush of gratitude. It has less to do with being out of his cell, with Pai again, and more to do with how patient she's been in the face of this debacle. In her place, Hei would've seethed at being kept in the dark. Especially with the original attack on Heaven's Gate still zinging with such resonance in the corners of his memory. ]

[ Lowering his voice, he murmurs, ]

I'll tell you what I learnt from Anonymous' notes. Once we're home and I've fed you an actual meal.

[Patience is a true Contractor's middle name. She is not pleased with the choices he made, but the past is the past, all's well that ends well, etc. Any resentment she may feel is weak, muted. It serves no purpose, so she doesn't entertain it.]

I want steak empanadas.

[(In her heart of hearts, she's even less resentful than she seems. But a guilty Hei is a Hei even more inclined than usual to give her what she wants.)]

[ Hei isn't sentimental in the accepted sense. Sentiment doesn't mean weakness, but the threat of someone to interpret it as such, a chink in the armor that invites clumsier errors. Hei's given up on that a long time ago -- but for everyone there is someone who gets under their skins, who touches spots and emotions and ideas like no one else does, and for whom they do the unthinkable. Pai is like that for Hei, just as he, he's beginning to realize too late, was like that for Amber. ]

[ He's smiling when he looks at Pai -- this wily yet still-innocent creature shuffled onto his deck, who thinks pouts and petulance will give her what she wants, when all she has to do is tell him. She can't coax or charm him into loving her more, not when he already does with everything he is. ]

I'll make so many you'll be sick of them.

[ It's as close as he gets to saying We're on borrowed time here, and I'll always make the most of it. ]

Nope. [She could never get sick of steak empanadas, okay? They are one of her Top Five Favorite Foods. She could eat buckets of them.]

Challenge accepted.

[ Never say never when you have a determined chef, an abundance of raw materials, and hours to prepare second and third helpings. ]

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♦♦ 30TH CONTRACT - ANONYMOUS TEXT/ ACTION

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