Seishi Diminutive by most people's estimation, this Asian woman stands only a little over five foot two and, though very fit, has a light build. Her face is smooth and angular, bones a bit strong for magazine-cover beauty, with a small and expressive mouth and a stubborn jaw; her eyes are true black, and distinctly Oriental. She wears her gleaming hair sleeked severely back into a neat braid--it is the shade of black that holds subtle blue and purple shimmers in the right light, and falls ribbon-straight halfway down her back, fine wisps framing her face. Her build is that of an athlete, all lean, understated muscle; she carries little extra weight. Not only is she fit, but she moves with uncommon balance, as though constantly aware and in control of her own body. One would expect, looking at her, that she exercises religiously. She wears a plain white teeshirt under a short jacket of vivid green leather; the jacket is loose and roomy at the shoulders and buttons snugly around her hips at the bottom, giving her a sharp and faintly masculine silhouette. Her blue jeans are badly faded and beginning to fray at the cuffs over a pair of comfortable, wear-worn white sneakers. Mismatched earrings--one a drop of faceted green glass, the other a small silver character of Japanese kanji--dangle from her earlobes; her only other piece of jewelry is a bracelet on her left wrist, polished triangles of jade and turquoise in fine silver filigree, a delicate touch not quite in keeping with the rest of her appearance. Her hands are deft, slender, and artistic, and she frequently uses them to emphasize her words. An experienced observer might notice that she keeps her fingernails trimmed neatly short, and that her palms and knuckles are callused from consistent and thorough work. Pete Wisdom Rather tall, but standing with an eternal slouch, Wisdom carries with him an aura of disreputability even when he's shaven and his clothes are clean and pressed. His left eye is covered unceremoniously by a black patch, a nasty scar running from above his eyebrow through down to his nose; other, lesser scars appear elsewhere. His remaining eye is a distractingly bright blue, and reflects a bitter cynicism, and it's apparent from the lines around it that he's likely earned the right to be jaded. The man's face is thin and pale, and his nose looks to be a bit thicker than it should be at the top, as though it'd been broken before but set correctly. His hair is jet black and somewhat long on top, though it's been cut recently and is short enough in the back; it has a tendency to fall into his face and shade his expression. Suits look absolutely natural on Pete, which is good, because it's all he'll ever wear. The one he's wearing now (which bears a remarkable resemblance to the one he wore yesterday, and the day before that, et cetera) is black, made of a fairly respectable fabric, and cut to a 'modern' style (which isn't the same as a modern style). Both the jacket and the trousers look almost streamlined; their lines coincide with Wisdom's. The lapels are narrow and point a bit upward, there're three buttons down the front instead of two, and his tie (made of matching material) is narrow. Around his neck, sometimes visible, is a thin silver chain from which conflicting pendants hang: a silver Star of David, smooth from age, and a tiny St. Jude medal. Seravina Duality, dichotomy, light and dark, sun and shadow. Sera is all of this, is all of vivid and all of pale, her expression and existence seemingly warring while her outer countenance strains quietly for peace. She's pale as any ghost, ivory skin gently touched by a muted glitter, without mark or scar, and her high, upswept cheekbones are only ever so faintly touched by a breath of crimson. Cascades of untamed wave and curl fall nearly to her hips, bearing a black so deep, it dreams of blue. A few tiny braids are decorated with bell, bone and bead, whispering and clicking amongst the loose curls. Her eyes are a starry night, glittering and watchful, large and luminous; they're fringed in thick lashes and ringed in kohl, their contrast stark upon a face that isn't beautiful, per se, but eerily striking. Almost haunting, almost lovely. Her lips are full; her nose is long and aquiline, her chin sharp, narrow--each of her features is nearly too bold, too proud, to belong to the others, but her face wears an expressiveness that conveys emotion with precise detail. Overly tall and slender, Sera's form seems to move from listless androgyny to something more feminine, and back again, as she walks or gestures. Blessed with fine dexterity, but lacking agility, her grace lies in the spidery, serpetine motions of her hands, but not in her walk. She wears a variety of rich greens; vibrant and alive in the way that spring is. A thin and flowing shirt drapes over her form; asymmetrically, it bares a shoulder, its hem sliding raggedly lower on that side. A flowing broomstick skirt swirls around her ankles, showing sandals when she walks. Its leaf-and-vine pattern could almost seem hypnotic, the tiny bells on the drawstring seeming like chimes from far off, sounding with each step. ****************************************************************************** Today's Weather: 'April showers bring May flowers'. Well, someone should tell the weather that April is over already! The sky is thick with an even blanket of gray cloud. The kind of featureless gray that tells even the heartiest optimist that it's gonna rain all day. The streets are slick and gleaming. People dash here and there, taking stupid risks crossing the street with newspapers covering their heads. Smarter folks have umbrellas. But no one is outside if they can help it. ****************************************************************************** Above the Shop -- Pilot Street Neither cramped nor spacious, this living area has been divided up by the strategic placement of a few dressing screens. A hodge-podge of Salvation Army furniture decorates, looking old, worn and comfortable, if seriously mismatched. Beanbag chairs share the floor with a mound of pillows, a rocking chair, an easy chair and an oversized chair that could easily fit two. A coffee table is covered in knick-knacks, papers and other assorted clutter. The walls, thus far, are relatively bare, and no carpet covers the scratched wooden floor. A single door leads to the bathroom, though a laundry basket seems to have overflowed there, and apparently desires a dirty clothes domination of the apartment, beginning with the bathroom. The kitchenette is clean and bare, and if one explores the refrigerator, they'll find an odd assortment of condiments, but little actual food. The upstair's door is wide open, and then music's playing at a level just below conversational. Dave Matthew's Band is playing 'The Dreaming Tree'; the song laments as Sera and Sei are in the living room area, the tables, chairs and small couch covered with small statuettes and figurines and such, each sitting out as though on impromptu display. The scent of cloves is in the air, a faint haze of bluish smoke lingering. Seishi chides gently, "If you're having trouble sleeping, you need to do something about it. You can only go so long without rest..." She bends over the table to get a closer look at one of the figurines, full of admiration. "...even as beautiful as these are." Sleep, /schmeep/. If only I could make everyone's face do that. Sera beams, loving every second of Seishi's reaction. She reaches to run a fingertip over the impossibly thin wing of a crouching pixie. "It hasn't been that bad," Sera lies, blatantly, easily. Why should I worry her? Haven't I done enough in that department? It's just being tired... get tired enough and that'll take care of itself. It's into this cloudy conversation - cloudy on several levels, apparently - that Wisdom walks; he makes enough sound on the stairs to alert the conversants to his approach, but not enough to be a big bloody nuisance. This /is/, after all, where Seishi told him to go. And when he gets to the top, gets in sight, it should be fairly obvious to Sei that he's gone the extra mile in making himself presentable: shaven, combed, clean, pressed. No trenchcoat. Suitjacket's open, no shoulder rig. Reasonably pleasant expression, even - unexpected, but really not such a stretch for a member of the intelligentsia. "Hullo," he calls, hands in his pockets. Sera was a little confused that someone was coming up the stairs, and she looks even /more/ confused now, to see Pete. Her brow furrows, a line drawn between the high arches of ebony upon her pale face. "Hi?" she wonders moving to stand, looking to Seishi with a briefly confused expression. Her dark eyes are wide and look vaguely redrimmed, either from crying or lack of sleep, perhaps both. Seishi looks up from the figurine she was admiring and instantly looks sheepish; "Wisdom-san." She turns a suddenly apologetic look toward Seravina, explaining quickly, "I'm sorry, I meant to tell you and then when I got here I got distracted... I invited him over. I thought, if you were willing, that he might be able to help you with your..." she gropes visibly for a word, settling on, "...ability?" "Talent," supplies Pete, not coming closer once it's established he hadn't been announced ahead of time. "But listen - if it's a bad time, that's all right. I can go..." He trails off, then mentally /damns/. "Ah, oh. Before you --" Bless. He's mortified. "It - I. We /have/ met. I wasn't myself. Apologise /profusely/ for my behavior, I was...seventeen. At the time. Bit confused." Bit confusing, more like. "The screaming boy?" Sera says, cocking her head to the side. Then, of course, she flushes, mortified, herself, and bites her lip, glancing down. "Pete... the... D'you know John Constantine?" She looks Pete over, curiously, dark eyes trailing over him. Pete the punk. "You had a nintendo cap. I'm sorry about the snowball. Jared wasn't real. Maybe if he was... his aim would've been better." I'll take surreal conversations for $500, please, Alex? "C'mon in," she says, and shoots Seishi a reassuring glance. It's all right. Trust me. "Can I get you a drink, or anything?" Seishi looks increasingly sheepish through all of this. Presently she retreats to the sofa, retrieving her glass of iced tea along the way and letting the two of them sort this out. She's here for moral support. Yeah. "Er," says Pete, actually turning red and looking away, apologetic half-grin on his face. "Yes. Well. The whole screaming bit - I really hope you didn't take it personally. I'm not in the habit of running like a little girl. Extenuating circumstances, and all that." /Man/. He shuffles a little, totally unconsciously. "And - ah - yes. Conjob dated my elder sister when I was quite small. Known him forever. Well. A version of him." Can't be outdone in the surreal department, now can we? At the invitation, he wanders in the rest of the way, enjoying the hell out of the smoke. "I - you know, I'd really /love/ a drink about now," he confesses ruefully, finally taking his hands from his pockets. See - he could be all Capable And On Top Of Things Guy right now, but the 'screaming boy' label's thrown him off his game somewhat. He glances helplessly at Seishi. She seems all right, ninja, were you having me on? Seishi looks just as helplessly back. She's made a proper hash of this, hasn't she? "I did mean to put it to you before he actually got here," she tells Seravina. "I'm dreadfully sorry--if I'd actually done it, we'd all have been much better prepared for this, I think." Nodding, Sera steps into the kitchen and says, "Tea, coffee, milk, juice, soda, partridge in a pear tree?" She mulls over 'Conjob', tasting the word on her lips, looking thoughtful. "Have a seat if you want? Watch out for the figures and the quasits and the--for what?" Sera looks over to them, hands almost on her hips. While from that distance, she might almost look as though she's got it together, the treble in her hands, her voice, the redness to her eyes... all these things speak of how she's slowly coming apart at the seams. Slowly. But surely. "Don't worry about it; this is Beacon Harbor. Life times Strange, squared," she quips. But her smile is almost strained. It's not that she's uncomfortable with company... it's that she's uncomfortable in her own skin. "Danny Bonaducci /is/ out of his tree, yes," says Pete, which is his way of joking over the fact he's slightly deflated by the lack of alcoholic choice. But really, it's better he keep away, just for now. Seiiii. Damn shame you're not a telepath. "These actors, I'm /telling/ you...tea would be lovely, ta." As he's talking, he's watching intently - all right. A mask, is it? Could wax philosophical and make some allusion to papier-mache in the rain, but that would only be pretentious. "And yeah, living here is almost as bad as consorting with the ruddy X-Men." Ta. Sera pauses. That face. That smile. She's standing at the door to the refridgerator, staring at the contents for a few moments. Without moving. Don't mind her. She's just... thinking. Yeah. And the draft is pleasant. Sure. "I think I've heard of them," Seishi murmurs dryly. "And given the example I've seen, I can't contradict you." She watches Sera over the back of the sofa, brow creased with concern. She makes her voice sound light. "Sera-chan?" "Hmmm?" Sera says, turning to look at Seishi. "Oh!" And she laughs, lightly, rummaging about to snag.. oh, hey, what's this? The last pint of Guinness, extra stout. And I'm never ever drinking, ever again. So "Pete? I've also got a Guinness, if a pint'd be favorite?" Ta. She blinks the word out of her head, lifting the bottle up to show, to offer. Conjob. She bites her own tongue, and smiles toward Seishi, shutting the refridgerator door shakily. The air in the room... thickens. Almost imperceptibly. Perhaps it's just that she's edgy and there's tension. Perhaps. Almost imperceptibly isn't the same as imperceptibly, and you've got one spy who's already on edge, and already paranoid, and also already on the lookout for weirdness because he's had a quick briefing on Sera's power. He *really* would like the Guinness, yes, but he also needs his head clear and his senses sharp. He'd've gone for it at first, but now he's nervous. "A Guinness? Ah, no, I couldn't have your last. Really /could/ use a cup of tea, though." A pause, and then a friendly interest, "That clove, by the by?" Seishi shifts forward a little in her seat, uncomfortably--she's grown too familiar with Sera's power not to be a little worried just at the moment. "Sera-chan," she wonders, voice carefully light, "what's on your mind? You seem... preoccupied." Sera puts on water for tea and comes back to the living room, dark eyes now centered on Pete. Who are you? She deftly flips her clove in one hand, smoking, the end bearing the ember sweeping up in a spiraling arc, and catches it between thumb and forefinger in a move that's almost too smooth to be real. A drag, and her expression is too calm, too collected. Exhale, and the sweet bluegrey smoke wreathes around her like an old lover. "Want one?" she wonders, her voice low and throaty. A shiver runs through her, and there's something almost like an electric tang in the air, wanting, waiting. "S'just been tense, lately," she says, shrugging. A week ago... I tried to kill myself. What... do YOU think... is on my mind? She hates herself in that moment, thinking unkind thoughts toward her first and best friend in Beacon Harbor. How can I even *think* of snapping at her? Wisdom meets Sera's gaze evenly, his one blue eye mild but unwavering, and his other jarringly covered by that patch of his. Not the same gaze as John's, not at all. His stance, too, is nothing like John's - Seishi would be able to recognise it as absolutely deadly tensely defensive, though it's not overt and is in no way reflected in his expression. What, he asks himself, the /hell/ is going on here? "If you've a spare," he replies with a grin. "An' as long as no one tells Lindsey. He'd tell Marley and she'd never let me live it down." "Yes," Seishi murmurs, her dark eyes lowering, "I can tell." Pete's words have her looking up again and quirking a vague, crooked grin. "My lips are sealed. Promise." She glances between the two of them, grin fading quickly, hesitant to say anything yet but looking rather as though she'd like to. The name sends an absolute thrill of agony through Sera; she tosses the pack toward Pete, watching him with something like a growing hunger, a predatory sort of glare. His nerves, Sei's concern, her tension, desire, impotent anger, helplessness... She's built herself her own little downward spiral, dug her own little rabbit hole, and damned if she isn't about to take a running leap into Wonderland. "They're blacks," Sera says, referring to the Djarum cloves. "Unfiltered." God, how her lungs are, currently, bleeding. She grinds her teeth at night, now, when she /does/ sleep. Smoking, bad eating, lack of sleep, stress... it's a wonder she's not already a basket case. "You're a friend of Lindsey's?" She thinks about it, and for a moment, says with a faint frown, "Next time you see Marley, make sure she's all right, would you? She got socked in the head pretty bad, this afternoon." There's a tangible charge in the air, a crackle, a flash of unreal blue, just outside the window toward the street. The sudden and reeking scent of ozone is heralded by a scream that somehow begins in the middle. There's a screech of tires, and that preciously, perfectly /too-familiar/ scream gets cut off. Suddenly. "Unfiltered cloves. I used to rip the filters off," says Pete, expression now a little strained but his tone still recalcitrantly conversational, friendly; he catches the pack effortlessly and starts pulling one out, keeping his monoptic gaze firmly on Seravina, reading her as best he can. "And yeah, he got me sorted when I came through the portal. Decent bloke. Good friend." A pause, as Pete's eyebrows go up. "She did, did she? I'll do th--" Pete freezes, color visibly and dramatically draining from his face. Literally, he goes white, and slowly looks toward the window. It takes him a good ten seconds before he can get anything out, and then it's a half-strangled and extremely quiet little set of words. "Seravina. If I calm down, will you?" Please. Please. /Please/ let that just have been Sera's power, oh god please. Seishi is on her feet in an instant--"I'll go see," she says softly, already moving toward the door, then hesitates, looking back between the two of them. So awkward; how do you treat this, when you're just not sure if it's a product of the tension, or if it's real? "...try to stay calm, okay?" she suggests meekly. "You guys probably shouldn't come see this if it's--" She breaks off, turning quickly and plunging forward down the stairs at a sort of running walk, her assertiveness given out on her. Fury. Hatred. Fear. Calm? You think I can just turn this off? Better yet... "Why is it," she whispers, getting the words out, low, trembling, /thick/ with emotion, "that everyone assumes, when hell breaks loose... that it's /my/ fault?" Ray came. Brought his Mountie. Wanted to *arrest* me. Said the dead people were *my* fault. Why was it six, and not seven, huh? Her dark eyes are whirling galaxies at twilight, glittering and navy to black, deep, cold, as empty and as devouring as space. She takes a drag off the cigarette, shuddering, and exhales, struggling, shaking, /straining/ to keep it together. There's car doors opening and slamming, running footsteps on concrete, people running to come and see the terror. There's a young man kneeling on the ground, his face chalky white, his hands trembling as he reaches toward the body that lays in the road, bent and broken. "She... she came out of nowhere..." he's heard to say. It'll be misquoted in the paper: 'It was like she came out of nowhere.' They never get it right. A high, thready, wet scream lifts into the night, the sweet voice of Kitty Pryde ravaged by pain, by fear. She's smeared in a wet crimson streak across macadam; only God might know how she's survived this far. One hand lifts, reaches, strains, clenches, unclenches, feebly reaching for the unseen as her body fails. One cheek is pressed into the blacktop, the surface of the road written forever into her pores, but the shining chestnut of her hair spills over the snapped shoulders of a once beautiful frame. She utters another word--it could've been 'Pete'--exhaling a thick runnel of red... and never again breathes in. Sera's clenching the table, glaring at Pete with something that's fear, that's hatred, that's anger. Don't you *do* this to me. This is your fault. God, I'm so /sorry/. Help me. Seishi stops short in the doorway of the empty shop--the scene hits like a hammer to the chest, and her face crumples with a sort of pained, sinking resignation. Once again, there's nothing she can do, nothing anyone can do except try to pick up the pieces. And hope, once again, that it's the lesser of two evils. There's no good here. She crosses the sidewalk and comes up uncertainly to the young man's side, dropping to one knee nearby. "It's not your fault," she tries to soothe, in a raw voice. Death never gets any easier to see. "Just stay here. Take deep breaths. I'll call..." hesitation "..an ambulance." He can't move at all. Pete can't move if he tries, rather; his hands are shaking quite involuntarily at his sides, and Sera's pack of Djarum Blacks is on the floor next to him. He quite resembles a man who's just lost everything all over again, and is clinging to a thin dry reed of insanity that whispers it's just an illusion. "We," he breathes raggedly, "aren't exactly. On an - a keel. An even keel. Your - it. Lindsey told me. His - his sister. Dying again. Impossible. This /is/ possible. I'm /praying/ it's you, I'm praying - I'm not blaming - not faulting you if it's you. But...Christ, I hope it is." Pete's desperately trying not to listen to the goings-on outside. But he can't help it. He can't help straining for confirmation, and then breaking when he hears it, and hears it stop. He's breaking quickly, Seravina, into pieces. "I won't," he says with a pathetic burst of both resignation and resolve. He came here to help. "I won't go look." And his gaze, at once haunted and dead, turns back to Seravina. "I'm sorry for whatever it was I did to you. Or didn't do." Look, he's crying, he's crying and obviously doesn't realize it, and he probably wouldn't give a shit if he did realize it. He closes his eyes, now, hands coming up to cover his face briefly - still-shaking hands. He concentrates on breathing, one breath after the next. Your one real, your one devastating weakness. But you're trained, Wisdom. You're trained. You may not have cared for a long, long time, but a reason to care is sitting in front of you, and another reason to care may have just died in the street outside. Make it worthwhile for one of them. "Let me - let me /in/, Seravina. I *can* help." His tone? Taking on a detached, relentlessly driven quality, even if it's still ragged and bleeding at the edges. Training, he's had training in detachment. Come on, Pete, 'use your powers for good'. Detachment isn't as good as real calm, but it might be something. Fumbling hands reach for Seishi, the young man little more than seventeen, his eyes blurred with disbelieving tears. "Didn't see 'er," he hiccups, shaking his head as he trembles. "I didn't... I cou-could... couldn't. Help... help it." Someday... Seishi may get it ground into her that there's nothing anyone can do, and why bother. Someday. Here in Beacon Harbor, it isn't an uncommon thing for the good guys to take a fall. Could be a tagline, even. 'Ever wonder what would happen... if the heroes lost?' Then again, giving up is what happened to Sera, only a week ago. The words, specifically, were 'I'm done'. Will Seishi ever fall that low? Ever stare, long and hard, at Holmes' stash, and wonder what it would be like? Will it be warm and smooth, like drowning in sun, to see your own end? Cold, sharp and hard like steel? As for Sera, who's now advancing on Pete in a menacing fashion, the end could have come graced--you'll never get a bad tip again, Melissa--from the sightless eye that's the hollow of a gun barrel, from the razor-slash slice of a keen knife--who'd have thought one person could bleed so much, eh Kyra?--from a needle piercing skin--did your daddy know you financed the backpacking-through-Europe on heroin and blowjobs, Shannon?--and offering up dreams, from the final leap--Marcus didn't even scream--of faith off Ninestory, from a piano wire strung over the top bars of your eldest's bunk bed--where you could have *stood up* at any time, stood up and saved your own life, Rene--to breathing in a heavy and sleeping death--sweet dreams, Justin--shut tight in the garage. It could have come from any of those, but instead it nearly came in the form of old ghosts that just won't die, themselves. Ghosts of dreams unrealised. Ghosts of failure. ghosts in bottles. "You want to help me, Pete? Why?" she wonders, her voice rattling as though she were coming apart from the inside out. "So you'll never hear that scream again unless it *is* real?" Sera says, hatefully. "So you can be sure that she really *is* broken?" Sera's all teeth and venom and things that slash and rip, tonight. "I can't be helped," she snarls, flicking her cigarette at him, haunted eyes hollow and bearing the softest kiss of the deranged. "I'm beyond help. You want to know why it was only six, and not seven?" Her voice rises, hysteria kicking in, the once sweet expression on Sera's face twisted into a wreckage of wrath and supreme hatred. "You want to know WHY?" she shrieks, lunging for Wisdom, all rage, unbound by reason. "Because the seventh had a few more lives to FUCK UP!"