Seeing Is Believing

Participants:

lexington_icon.gif rhys_icon.gif

Scene Title Seeing Is Believing
Synopsis Rhys informs someone of their destiny, and gets a rockin' outfit in the process.
Date October 18, 2010

Miss Aphrodisia's


The curtains to the dressing room are flung back as the diminutive young man glides out from behind them. It's a three-piece suit, rather small fitting which suits the teenager just fine — Lexington Lane only got it in just yesterday, and yet, Rhys Bluthner seemed to gravitate right towards it as if knowing exactly what he was looking for. Would be looking for. One of those things. With a fedora perched on his brunette head, the young man tweaks the sit of it, before turning a heel to look around for the owner of the store.

"What do you think?" he asks. "Kind of Road to Perdition with less shooting. I've always thought about going— " To the 30s, probably wouldn't make a lot of sense, when he thinks about it, blue-green eyes widening beneath the hat's brim shadow as he reconsiders, and finishes with; "to Illinois."

Turning towards a nearby mirror, the rosy-cheeked boy clears his throat, adjusts the sit of his waistcoat. "I didn't see a pricetag. I assume I might need to turn tricks in Brooklyn to make up for the dent to my wallet."

"I wasn't aware Illinois had such a nice dresscode," Lexington says in her Irish accent, a crooked smile on her face. "But it fits like it was made f'r ya, hunny, that's for sure." The proprietor comes out from behind her counter with a charming smile at the ready. "Aye, ya might, but I guarantee it'd be worth it. We just got it in, I couldn't resist putting it out this mornin'."

"Illinois has Chicago, which has Chicago," Rhys points out, taking off the fedora with a shrug of his shoulders beneath the fine lines of his jacket. "And I've never said no to a vaudeville musical about vaudeville." Biting his bottom lip in consideration, he steps sideways to pick up the messenger bag he brought with him, placing down the hat so as best to rifle through it. "Well, let's be perfectly honest — I was never going to walk out of this store a rich man. Here we go. Lay it on me."

Moving up the counter, he rifles through his wallet, thumbing through notes until he encounters something small and papery. Purses his mouth in some consideration, but is listening for a price.

Lexington laughs lightly and nods her head, "Ya have a point there, I suppose Chicago calls for a cigar and a tommy gun even still." And when he heads for the counter, she walks that way, too, taking his words as a compliment. "But you'll look like a million, luv," she quips as she slips behind the counter.

"One vintage suit, with the eyecandy discount," she notes with a crooked smile his way, "comes t' eight hundred fifty."

The money is coming out even before she announces the price itself, like Rhys knows, although he isn't handing green bills over just yet, wobbling them in the air as he considers with a slanting glance off the side, an eyebrow raising. "What if we struck a bargain?" he proposes, in the kind of coy attitude of someone who— isn't a professional negotiator by any stretch of the imagination, but the suit does make the man, occasionally. "Like say, you knock off a hundred bucks, I get to eat dinner tomorrow, and— "

He gestures with cash at her, some degree of selfconscious hesitation more than dramatic effect in his pause. "And I give you the ticket to finding out what your superhuman ability is supposed to be."

Lifting an eyebrow as the negotiations start in, Lexington folds her arms on the counter and leans over a bit, looking a touch amused. She is, after all, familiar with this particular game. "Oh, starting with the sympathy card. That only works if you've got a couple wee babes with ya," she says teasingly. But, as he goes on, she eyes him for a moment. Skeptical.

And then there's a chuckle. "My what? Luv, you're loonier than Canadian money," she notes, although there's still a friendly bent to the words. New York and it's crazies.

There is a small, only slightly feigned shudder at having an wee babes in his vicinity, but his posture and demeanor doesn't otherwise change — money is still held aloft, and his pale-eyed focus remains on her. "Your superhuman ability," he repeats, patiently adding, "And yes, I've been told. But I guess that means you're not going to believe me." What's the point in saving the world if you're not going to get a discount now and then? Setting the money down, apparently trusting respectable shop owner not to snatch, Rhys fingers through his wallet once more.

What is produced is a mildly flattened paper crane, and this is set down next to the money, which a quick count will tell Lexington is seven fifty as opposed to offered eight. "Take it or leave it, girlfriend. If you don't believe me about being one of us, you need to get on the pointy end of an SLC test."

And she doesn't snatch, she's too busy giving him an odd look, like she doesn't know if what sort of game he's playing right here. "I mean… I don't… I haven't ever taken the test, but I'm gettin' toward thirty, luv, and no laser beams 'r super strength 'r pointy claws 'r nothin'." But he sets down the crane, and she peers at it for a moment or two before she reaches out to take the money. "How would ya know a thing like that, anyway?" She even prints him out a receipt to pass over. But her fingers can't leave that crane alone for long, and she pluck it up to prop the smushed thing in her palm. "Poor little thing, seen a few rough days, huh?"

Rhys seems to relax a fraction as she opens up and takes the offer, lacing his fingers together as he watches her go through the motions. "I leave it somewhere for you to find, but I prefer the personal touch, you know? So, I decide not to. As much as I can, anyway — some people this round aren't even getting a briefing. But somehow it all works out." He pauses, then glances back to her face, rosy cheeks going a little redder. "Sorry. I know this sounds— odd.

"But I have an ability that sees the past. Sort of. I see it like the future. And I see you getting involved in something— something bad. But you're important. Not because of claws or super strength or anything, but something else. Something that saves lives. It's special, I mean— I just see a lot of people get hurt."

The paper crane isn't all white, Lexington can see that — there's grainy, photocopied photography within.

"Odd is a mild way of puttin' it," Lexington reaches over to pat him on the arm, though, reassuring. "It's okay. I've been on blind dates before," she adds with a little smirk. She actually hasn't, but that's neither here nor there.

When he goes on, though, she frowns gently. Heroic is not something she'd call herself. Important, not so much, either. Saving lives, beside her own, has never been her business. But, she'd be lying if she said this guy didn't have her intrigued. And it's only a moment before she starts carefully unfolding that crane. "A lot of people, huh?"

Of course, she was never heartless, either.

"In this city," is murmured, but Rhys watches her open the crane with a degree of nervousness, like he'd prefer to take off while she's— busy— doing that. But he stays put, leaning to peer into a mirror and bring a hand up to adjust the sit of his hair that had come ruffled with taking off the fedora, smoothing glossy brunette strands back into place while still watching her out the corner of his eye.

Lexington doesn't see much, in truth, when she opens the page. It resembles a newsletter, of kinds, with the poor quality making the words difficult to read, but the pictures themselves are familiar in that no one lives under a rock. Most people know what soldiers in the jungle is supposed to denote, all candid photography, dirt-tracked faces, the occasional angles spared towards the more ethnic demographic of the country they're in.

"Anyway," Rhys says, plucking up the receipt, waving it like a flag. "It was a pleasure doing business with you."

Lexi might have lived under a rock or two in her time, but that picture still gets a huff of surprised recognition from her. "I don't…" Her brow furrows and she looks up from the paper to him, confusion plain. "What am I supposed t' do about this?" It's not exactly a farewell, because she's really just too puzzled to be a good saleswoman at the moment.

"Keep it," Rhys suggests, moving to collect up his bag, the sleeve from the sweater he'd been wearing prior to getting redressed just peeking out from the flap. "And just— try not to be surprised, or— " Struggling, apparently, to give her any better advice, mouth thinning in an anemic line before he shakes his head. "I guess you could ring up one of your contacts and get yourself a gun you think you could handle? I'm assuming that's how it happens."

He then moves for the door, fedora at a kicky angle, before he spins neatly to address her again. "One more thing. The pharmacy, a block from here? It's open until eight. I suggest you swing by and get one of those little home Evo test things. Seeing is believing. Trust me." And with that, he hattips her, and swishes on for out like some kind of small if unstoppable force of nature.

She can't help but chuckle at his reply. Keep it. It's a nervous sort of laugh, there because she really doesn't know how else to react to this whole conversation. "That's… pretty much how it happens, yeah." The idea that she's going to need a gun, of course, doesn't come as much of a shock considering.

Lexi doesn't stop him this time, she just gives him a sort of helpless look before nodding to his parting advice. She might be a little pale, but who can tell on that fair, Irish skin?


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