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| You and I in a Little Toy Shop; [Madrox] | |
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| Topic Started: Feb 8 2013, 03:40 PM (285 Views) | |
| Basswave | Feb 8 2013, 03:40 PM Post #1 |
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Feb. 4th Mutant Town 11am "I drove back to that place the other night." She said, looking to Madrox as they strolled their way down the street. "I worked my way back and when I got there, nothing. Whole place is cleaned. Wiped off the map. Empty hallways. Those things. All gone." She shook her head. "I couldn't even get a picture off of anything. It's been scrubbed down on a mental level." She turned to look at him. "That scares me. It's like we must have ate babies in a previous life or something. Who does this to people?" She pulled her sunglasses up over the top of her brown mop of hair, tired eyes leaking that violet-pink hue in a subtle manner, right eye marked with that mutual M. M for mutant. M for Mindfuck. What was that all about? Nemesis had said it was more than just simple ink or scarring. Something burned into their genetic templates. Who exactly had they pissed off? The signs of restlessness and insomnia were apparent in her eyes, or rather under them. She hadn't had a good night's sleep since that first day back. "A year, we've been gone, man. Not a whole year maybe but enough to convince everyone that we were dead. We've got headstones and everything. Nemesis says my body's missing from my grave. Dead Girl's breathing now. Someone is working to cover their tracks and it makes me sick to my stomach. Like this is some big cosmic prank." She'd gotten to be fairly good friends with Madrox since moving into Mutant Town a couple years back. When she'd assumed leadership of X-Corps, a lot of her social life had died with the decision. That their spark of friendship would ignite again over their seemingly divine ressurections? That was right at the top of the list of things she never thought she'd say. Hartley sipped her coffee, stretching her free-hand underneath the glove. It was strange, getting used to wearing that sort of thing constantly. Training from Xavier's had helped her manage quickly to get a reign on it. Her powers had always required a bit of concentration to reign in, but this was like a new muscle now, and she was learning all over again. "I get these... lapses, Jamie. Like when you haven't slept in a while and you jump awake even though you never really fell asleep. Only it's with memories. Like I suddenly feel like I'm in the wrong place. That I don't know anybody I know, and then like that I'm back to normal." She bit her lip under tooth. She wanted to just go back to the hotel, horde into the incidentals, and pass back out. "I haven't told Nemesis yet. I feel like he'll think I'm crazy. It's already crazy. I used to have a checkerboard of burn scars across my back from Apocalypse' ash nanites and now it's clear as day. Nothing makes sense..." She shook her head, stopping at a crosswalk and pushing the button on the pole. "Sorry for ranting. How are things going on your end?" |
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| Jamie Madrox | Feb 8 2013, 05:40 PM Post #2 |
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It scared Jamie too. He slurped at the last bit of his smoothie as the two of them walked down the sidewalk together and he listened to her disturbing account and he thought about what in the hell was going on. Since that day when they had been reborn as it were, Jamie and Hart had become very good friends. There were no answers to be had, but they tried to puzzle it out together and it probably wasn’t an accident that he didn’t know she was going there to find out what was going on because he would not have allowed it. At least not without a platoon of dupes to back her up. But what was done was done. Like this smoothie. He tossed the empty cup into a trash can as they passed it. “First of all,” he said. “We did not eat babies. I don’t even think I could eat veal because it’s too awww…but the ironic part of that is that I have no problem whatsoever with eggs. I know. It’s a mystery.” He didn’t like any of this. The place was gone? Scrubbed? The tattoo thing was irreversible? Though honestly he was getting attached to it in some ways. He told himself it made him look tough no matter how much Guido told him it made him look like a fairy. “I get them too.” He said over his shoulder as they passed a long row of intricate window dressing. “I don’t know…just these random memories of things. Like dreams but I know they were real. Sometimes it sticks and sometimes it fades away.” This was one reason that they were so close. They were their own support group. Jamie had Alix who could understand in a vicariously intimate sort of way…but with Hart it was different. They were both adrift somewhat, and without the anchor of XF-Investigations and Alix he would be doubly conflicted. “I’ve brought it up before, and you always blow it off. But come and spend some time with us. We have our own little mystery here. We can work on this one together, and maybe you’ll find something to help you get your bearings.” He put one arm around her and looked her in the eye. “Come on. Everyone loves a good mystery.” |
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| Basswave | Feb 8 2013, 06:01 PM Post #3 |
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Hartley, even in her seemingly perennial newfound grumpiness, had to stifle a laugh. Jamie Madrox had an uncanny knack for bringing much-needed to levity to any situation, regardless of the gravity involved. It was refreshing, though she'd never admit it. She needed a bit of laughing in between all the angsting that she seemed to have fallen into stride for. She was happy that she didn't catch a lecture for going on her own. It had been late, and as much as she wanted to use the excuse that she didn't want to bother anyone at two in the a.m., she and likely he would know that that was a lie. It was an attempt to take control of the situation without relying on anyone. Without having to have some sort of crutch, like Bradley's bank card or someone handholding her. Knowing she wasn't alone in having those little episodes was another boon. She suddenly didn't feel so lost at sea. Madrox had seemed to take it all so lightly, and when she'd seen him go right to Alix's arms, there was a flange of jealousy there. She'd sat, telephone in hand, at least two dozen times now, staring at Robert Drake's cellular number, too frightened to hit send for fear of what had happened with her parents happening with him. And it wasn't like they could deny it forever. She was here, she was breathing. It wasn't a joke, not some cruel prank. This was real stuff, as fantastic as it might have seemed. But the wounds, she supposed, were still open, still raw. Too soon for my own homecoming, she'd muse to herself before throwing the phone onto a desk or into her pocket. "The more that happens," she began as he put an arm around her, shaking her head. "I don't know if I want to solve it." She looked to him, genuinely concerned. "Remember St. Elsewhere? What if this is all some kids dream and we're both really dead." She'd dodged his invitation again, instead focusing on the other half of his assertion. It was outlandish, really, this fear of committing to anything. She'd already told Nemesis that she'd not be returning to X-Corps. There was too much there that hurt. She had a statue there. That alone was too much. She'd considered going abroad again, losing herself somewhere in the South Pacific, hunt down the other members of her post-apocalypse rescue crew. Anything but stay here. But she couldn't tear herself away from this city, not right now. There was way too much to find out, Jamie, in the end, was right. This was a mystery that needed solving, no matter how much she loathed the idea of the ending. "I could use some work, I guess." She said, finally giving in to the suggestion. "And a place to stay that isn't costing X-Corp money." She turnedto face the window of some small mom and pop Toy-Store. Very homey, very old school. Her violet-brown eyes scanned the things in there. Action figures from all makes and varieties waging war in some panoramic display, a kid moving them all about. Her gaze snapped to her own reflection, to that M emblazoned over her eye. "I feel like someone is playing us like toy soldiers." She turned back to him. "Do you think it's that Spiral woman? The one that's been targeting XFI?" |
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| Jamie Madrox | Feb 10 2013, 05:40 AM Post #4 |
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“Did you just make a reference about a show from the eighties and somehow tie it into our lives?” He thought about it and maybe he really didn’t understand what the reference was saying exactly…but he had to admit it was a pretty good (and by good he meant obscure and possibly over his head) cultural reference. He frowned. “I’m impressed. But if I’m a young Howie Mandell in some kid’s dreams I think I need to know that. You know what I mean?” He sighed a little and leaned down to let her in on a little secret. “If this is a dream and we aren’t really alive at least we have each other.” It was heartfelt even though he didn’t doubt for a second that they were in fact alive and not in fact dreaming the whole thing up. It didn’t slip his notice that Hart was coyly evading the whole discussion of whether or not to come work for them. They were filling up fast and were it any other situation he might not have so readily made the invitation. But this was different on every level. This felt right. And he knew at least some of why she was hesitant, the thoughts occurring to him distantly as he looked into their reflections in the Toy Store glass and listened to what she was asking. “I don’t know what she is or how she ties to all of this.” There were pieces he could not tell Hart now. Things he hadn’t even told Guido…and it pained him. “But we will find out. You can give me a trial run. Just see what pans out in it. I’m not making you sign a contract or stay with us if you don’t feel like it. But give it some time. I think partially…I want you there.” After a few more minutes he turned to her and looked her straight in the eyes. “And call him. He’ll want to hear from you. For his sake and yours and for closure’s sake. For Howie Mandell’s sake! Just do it. When you get a chance give him a call.” There was a slight pause before he added. “Last thing you want is him finding out some other way. And he will.” |
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| Basswave | Feb 28 2013, 05:08 PM Post #5 |
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"That's what I mean. What if this is all just some pipe dream. Sorry, I've been having wild Matrix theories ever since we woke up. I just don't really want this t be real." Saying it out loud seemed to hammer home how stupid and idealistic it all might have sounded, because her face twisted into one of disapproval. Her question of Spiral was met with an optimistic retort and once again the affable Madrox carved a smile out of a frown with her. She thought back to that explosive phone call with her parents, the threat shouted through the phone by her own brother, and suddenly the idea of someone wanting her around, just the simple speaking of those words, put a coat around a cold heart. And so she nodded, despite noting that there seemed to be a quiet lie of omission somewhere in this conversation. If there were, she wasn't sure which of the two of them was telling it. Then Bobby came up and she lowered her head, shaking it back and forth. "Someone told me he was one of those things, Jamie. Those Skrulls. For most of the time I knew him it wasn't even him. I... just." There were a thousand ways to say this to Madrox and a nine hundred and ninety nine of them were probably better than the way she'd chosen but she felt it needed said none the less. "I don't want to talk to him, he's so excitable. He'll either go nuts or go crazy, and if he wants to get back together, how do I tell him no? That I'm not interested? That I want to sit here grim and uncommitted and figure this out? He'll try to cheer me up and I won't. It's... let's just not talk about that." She tossed her coffee cup aside into a streetcan and looked at Madrox, face to face. "I'll give XFI a try. At least until we figure this out. After that... no guarantees." Were there ever any? |
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| Jamie Madrox | Mar 1 2013, 12:14 PM Post #6 |
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Jamie knew immediately that he had hit somewhat of a sore spot. He caught the look on Hart’s face out of the corner of his eye and felt bad for even bringing the whole Bobby thing up because of it. What he had not known was that Bobby had been a Skrull through the majority of their relationship. He frowned when he heard it. Her reaction most certainly made sense. Guido had told him about the little mission they’d been on. He’d told him about Bobby and the state of mess he’d been in most likely over the whole Hart ordeal. He’d told him about how the one time and usually jovial Bobby Drake had been full of vengeance and fury and the almost startling level of destruction he was capable of when he really wanted to be. There was really no need to mention any of that right now, or most likely ever. He let the whole matter drop. If she didn’t want to talk about it and if thinking about it brought even half as much agony to her as he thought he detected in her eyes then the matter was as good as swept under the rug as far as he was concerned. When she stopped and turned to him he knew it was with introspection and sincerity and so he waited until she was finished before saying anything one way or the other. Letting a reflective moment pass before he said anything at all, Jamie shrugged. “Well that’s perfect then. That’s what I’m doing too. Just sort of passing through until I get the band going. Jamie and the Multiples. Oh yeah, we’re going to rock this town and then you know, this whole private investigator thing…well, that’s going to have to take a back seat because it’s all about the music from then on. And wealth and fame and groupies.” He smirked at her. “But seriously…we’re glad to have you with us for as long as you want or need to be.” After they’d started walking again and went a few hundred feet in silence, he turned to her curiously. “If you had your preference would you prefer to room with an indecipherable Scotsman, a feral Canadian with questionable hygiene, or a Cajun woman who is on the verge of murder half the time?” Rolling his eyes a little he added. “Hypothetically.” But these were the details that they could work out later. As they continued to walk, they talked, they laughed and they planned. And that was the story of how Hartley first became affiliated with X-F Investigations. |
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7:31 PM Jul 11