I'm nearly human look at me

[unobtainableredemption]

Characters: Kaine and OPEN
Date: Sometime after the bottle event
Location: Various
Situation: Various
Warnings/Rating: PG-13 to be safe (for Kaine's mouth)


Option 1 - Fire Sector
[Kaine’s standing in front of a storefront, looking through the window at the mantle displayed on the other side and debating whether or not he wants to buy one. Not for the fashion, mind you, but for something he could temporarily wear to cover his face and conceal the giant shiner surrounding his left eye. It’s a cliché, but you should really see the other guy.]


Option 2 - Water Sector
[He had intended to go right home, but now that his face was concealed by the hood of his newly bought mantle, Kaine finds himself walking right past the door to his suite, eventually winding up in a park in the water sector. It's clear by the path of destruction as he enters that one of the baby turtles had been through recently--the rubble had not yet been pushed to the side. He found himself smiling despite himself. When were they going to learn that they couldn't destroy everything?

Kaine sits on one of the benches and pulls the hood low as to cover his black eye, and just stares out at the mess. He could head home some other time.]


Option 3 - Metal Sector (Wearing this costume, though he still has short hair)
[He had forgotten how heavy the outfit was. It was the complete opposite of his Scarlet Spider costume—bulky with ridges and angles that have angles. Then there was the cape. What was he thinking when he added a cape to this thing? There was no reason for it whatsoever. Not like the raised “veins” of the costume, which had once pressed upon the scars of his degeneration to slow its progress, but now just serve to remind him of where the scars used to be. It was perfect.

He couldn't be the Scarlet Spider anymore. Not after what had happened in the bottle. It only served to remind him just how different he was from the others, and just how far he had fallen from what he could have been. And then he found this, his old outfit that once kept him alive, the outfit he wore during the year he spent terrorizing both Reilly and Parker, as well as anyone they might have cared about… and if that wasn't divine intervention, he didn't know what was.

Kaine leaps to the next building, never losing a stride in his step. He’s trying to get used to the suit’s bulk by doing something he’d done hundreds of times in it before... but if he bothered to stop and think about it, he’d realize just how suspicious he looks dressed like that leaping across rooftops at a sprint.]

OOC: If you want to roll with something other than those, feel free to either PM me, reach out to me at redconfession, or just start a thread, your choice.

Comments

[problematical]

[ She studies him for a moment at that quick reply, head tilted. ]

Not for asking. But maybe who is needed.

[unobtainableredemption]

[He looks down at her, surprised by her response. Frankly, he didn't expect her to be so insightful, especially given their conversation up till now.]

I'm not the one they needed, either. They picked the wrong brother.

[He sighs.]

All I wanted was to go to Mexico and stick my feet in the sand...

[problematical]

You never think it, you're too full of contradictions. Good and bad and right and wrong, sometimes you're not even who you think you are.

[ She meets his stare unblinkingly, which in itself is slightly eerie. ]

[unobtainableredemption]

[Frankly this is on par for the course with the teenagers in his life. He doesn't even blink at that.]

I always know who I am. It's everyone else that tries to claim I'm someone I'm not. [...Like a hero.]

[problematical]

[ River breaks the stare, her fingers coming up to brush against the aged necklace, thinking Kaine's answer over. Whatever course of thought she'd been pursuing seems to have been abandoned for the moment. ]

But you'll show me the city?

[unobtainableredemption]

I have nothing better to do and getting lost in some of these neighborhoods is suicide.

[problematical]

[ She smiles at Kaine, ducking her head a little. ]

I'm not scared. Are you worried about me?

[unobtainableredemption]

...I know better than to bet against weird teenage girls. [But at the same time, that isn't a "no."]

[problematical]

"Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time."

[ She's smiling knowingly, though the Shakespeare quote might seem out of place. ]

Let's go.

[unobtainableredemption]

Othello? [To say Kaine is rusty on his Shakespeare is an understatement. Be glad he recognizes it as Shakespeare at all.]

This way. [Brings her to the water sector and begins pointing things out. His explanations are short and extremely practical, staying along the lines of "this area is dangerous at night", "this tailor will make normal clothes on commission," and "this place has good take out."]

[problematical]

Merchant of Venice. [ River nods to the canals of the Water Sector in which they stroll. ] I thought it fit.

[ She listens attentively to each description of the places they pass, committing each of them to memory. ]

How long have you been here?

[unobtainableredemption]

Sounded like it... I can't say I'm familiar with the play, though. [He's admitedly not the book smart brother. He is, however, the brother that's seen the most of the world.] Ever been to Venice? Beautiful city.

6 months now. [He hadn't realized until he says it out loud that he's been here that long. The time's flown.]

[problematical]

No... it was part of Earth That Was, it's gone now.

[ She notes the surprise. ]

Do you have others?

[unobtainableredemption]

Was? Like what, it... exploded? [Of course this girl was from some freaky post-apocalyptic future. Because why wouldn't she be?]

Others? You mean family, people I know? My younger brother and my niece are here. What about you, you got anyone? [He knows he already asked, but it never hurt to ask a different way.]

[problematical]

[ The guess makes her laugh, shaking her head. ]

It got too crowded and too dirty, so it gave up and everyone fled to the stars.

Inara was here.

[unobtainableredemption]

[Points to some graffiti on the wall, and tells her of the various gang signs (that he's figured out so far) and how best to avoid bad neighborhoods.]

Glad to know that we screw that one up no matter what the world. [Is that what their world is going to go to? Up in god knows where with the skrulls and Galactus and the whoever? If that does happen, it better be after he's gone--he would rather not fly around in space like he did briefly in the tiny universe. It's decidedly not his thing.]

And I take it by the was that she's one of the people that's since gone home?

[problematical]

[ River ones her fingers over one of the graffiti marks. ]

I should learn this... be something new. Someone said it was hard to learn.

[ She steadfastly doesn't look at Kaine when he correctly guesses about Inara. ]

She's wanted to leave. Maybe she came here to get away.

[unobtainableredemption]

Only if you don't know what you're looking for. [Which, frankly, is why he can make out as many as he does. He pays attention to the signs idiots are tagging on the walls before he takes them out.] If we were back in Houston I'd be able to explain all of it.

[Whoops.]

I don't think anyone plans to come here... but that said, I don't think this place is all bad, either.