Visions-A-Plenty

Participants:

joseph_icon.gif rebecca_icon.gif

Scene Title Visions-A-Plenty
Synopsis Rebecca visits the Guiding Light Baptist Church with designs on helping them find their vandal, but doesn't expect the insight she receives.
Date July 20, 2009

Guiding Light Baptist Church

There is no mistaking this building as anything but a church, with its arching glass windows and concrete cross fixed to the edge of the pointed roof. Curving stone steps lead up from the pavement to a set of black double doors, often kept closed during the colder weather, but unlocked during the allocated hours written on a blue sign fix to the brick wall. In white, formal letting, it reads GUIDING LIGHT BAPTIST CHURCH and lists its hours of worship.

Through the doors, you first step into an open, nondescript foyer, with access to an unobtrusive staircase headed upwards, and a second hallway leading off somewhere less public also. Mainly, this room opens straight out to the much more spacious worship hall, with immovable rows and rows of pews. A small church, it only seats an absolute maximum of around one hundred and fifty people at a time. It has a high ceiling and is warmly lit, simple and reverent in design, colours light and earthy. The stage before the pews is wide open, with seats off to the side for other pastors and guest speakers, and there is a podium placed off center. On the other side, there is a small organ with music sheets kept nearby.


It's the heart of summer and yet somehow, it just never seems to get overly hot. The temperature sits on a tepid balance, neither hot nor especially cool, the air stagnant and the sky clear of clouds. During such days, it's often that Joseph will try to meander outside now and then, whether to walk his dog around the block, read on the steps, or annoy neighbouring loiterers into conversation. At the moment, he seems content to stand against the metal railing that lines the front of the grey-stone church, a folded over newspaper in hand. Each passerby gets a quick glance, perhaps to judge as to whether or not they'll enter the church or not and whether he should follow, but more so today - expecting a meeting.

He's dressed in a light grey suit, the jacket discarded up in his office, revealing the eggshell blue shirt it would have otherwise covered. The cuffs are rolled partway up his forearms, a wrist revealing a watch and wedding band on the appropriate finger. No reading glasses, so he's squinting, minorly, at the—

The comics section. Already having perused all the more pressing current affairs, or so Joseph will claim.

"Oh dear." she mutters to herself as she scurries down the sidewalk. Rebecca Nakana is rarely punctual it seems, as she is late for meetings at work, late for phone calls home and it seems late for nearly every appointment she attempts to keep. She's not entirely sure where she got turned around, but by the time she corrected herself, she was already running fifteen minutes past by the time she gets to the church.

Having to process 15 rounds, with 15 casings to make sure they were all from the same weapon was tedious at best and then she missed her bus transfer on the way over. She's dressed in black slacks and a grey blouse, having to forgo her usual white one which would be an entirely different story. For now, she finally sees that stone wall of the church. She nods politely to the man waiting by the entrance as she moves to slip past him and inside.

And Joseph of course offers a smile and nod back, dark eyes tracking back down to Garfield to see what that wacky cat is up to today— then up again when he hears her foot steps switch up to head upstairs, towards the double black painted doors of the church's entrance. There's a rustle as he folds his newspaper up once more, lowering it as he takes his weight off the fence, and a step in her direction.

"Ma'am?" is offered after her, clear as a bell and with that distinctive Tennessee twang. "Miss Nakana?" Look, it's a good guess. She's dressed professionally and is moving with all the grace and intent of someone late for a very important date. Nothing to do with her heritage whatsoever.

.. which is what Rebecca would have used to make an educated guess. The Asian woman turns around. "That's me. Sorry I'm late and I'm sorry I walked right by you and I guess I just didn't expect to see the Pastor standing out on the sidewalk." Seems she rambles when she is nervous. "Detective O'Shea sent me. She said you were expecting me?"

A large black purse is strapped over her shoulder and hangs between her hand and her hip. "She said something about vandals and that they hadn't gotten anywhere on it. She thought I could come by and take a look?" Not just with her gift. Though some time has passed since the incident, it wouldn't be uncommon for Rebecca to spot something the others have missed, if the elements haven't taken it to task. "It's a shame really. I'm hoping I can help."

She offers her hand, "Call me Rebecca, please." She's yet to be all to comfortable with the titles that come along with being on the force.

Her hand is met in a firm, professional clasp and shake, as if it were something Joseph does a lot - which, incidentally, it is. "Yes ma'am, I was expecting you. I was just enjoying the nice day out," he says, retracting his hand but not his smile. "It gets awful warm up on my office and I wouldn't want to miss out on the nice weather the Lord's seen fit to grant us, now would I?" An added nod, along with, "It's nice to meet you, Rebecca, you can call me Joseph."

And Joseph takes a step back from the church, and gestures towards it with a sweep of his folded newspaper. "This would be where they did it. Abigail— she's the one that contacted Detective O'Shea for me, she took some pictures of what was done to the place, but it's been cleaned up since, obviously. May the 23rd, I recall, if— " He hesitates, then, and glances towards her, eyes narrowing. "If that helps any. Sorry, I don't quite know how this works, or anything."

As she listens to the story, her brown eyes begin to do a scan of the place. Nearly two months of weather will do alot to evidence and she really doesn't expect to find anything.

"Well, I don't know what you've been told about what I can do. I can see into the past, but there's a trick to it all, I'm afraid. A few hoops I need to jump through to make it work. Having the date makes it far more easier for me, so I appreciate that."

As expected, weekly visits by parishoners would have trampled any evidence she might have expected to collect, so coming up dry there, she reaches into her purse and pulls out a mirror. "I'm going to sit. There are a few side effects to what I do and since you are the only one here at the moment, I think you should be aware. I can become disoriented and I have had the occasional nosebleed. I always get headaches. I'm going to sit down when I do this, to prevent falling." She feels like she's reading off a prescription bottle. "I've never actually passed out, so if something worse happens than I've described, you should probably call an ambulance."

She hates to cause anyone to worry, but she does feel better laying it all out there just in case there's a complication. She's already begin to worry about the headaches she's been having that have come on their own without the visions and the pain medicine that she'd been taking far more frequently than she probably should. Finding a place to sit on a step, she actually faces away from the church. She hasn't looking into the mirror as of yet. "If you haven't any questions, I can start now."

Joseph listens attentively, worrying the newspaper in his hands and nodding his understanding. Concern makes his smile fade and brow crease, but otherwise, he doesn't seem prepared to intervene with the woman doing her job. "Alright," he says. "No, no questions." He takes several steps back from the church, as if that would help any, coming to stand right on the curb. "You just yell out if you need anything, alright?"

He can't help but watch her, either, fascinated as most people might be when it comes to displays of power, abilities that they don't have or aren't their own. Especially when you consider the nature of his own in comparison to the nature of Rebecca's.

They tell her she'll get used to it, but that doesn't help the apprehension that sets in when she grips the mirror tightly in both hands. She brings it up in front of her face, so she sees the building behind her and suddenly there's activity. She's able to go back to that date, but because of the late hour, it's darker in the mirror. She watches as they deface the holy place, a grimace coming across her face.

Unfortunately, while she can go back in time, once the scene is in motion, she can't speed it up. Everything is happening real time to her. She sits there nearly an hour, watching as they do what damage they can to the outside, when one of them suggest they use the key to trash in the inside next. She watches as they try to use the key, but fail to get inside. A curious expression crosses her face during all of this. Finally, in the end, they give up and leave, at least pleased with what they were able to do. It's then that Rebecca breaks the vision, turning the mirror away from her, setting it down and reaching for her medicine.

After taking two pills, she drops her head, letting her hair form a curtain around her face as she rubs at her temples. "They admitted some sort of allegience to Humanis First. There were three of them. They had a key and thought it would get them inside, but it didn't work. They were going to wreck the inside as well. Luckily, the key didn't work." she manages to mutter as she waits for the pain to subside.

Joseph is a patient man, taking to pacing, reading his newspaper once more, but mainly pacing as Rebecca does her thing. He doesn't seem inclined to leave her— save for, at one point, retrieving a bottle of water— despite the amount of time it takes, silently curious - watchful, too, in only the way a shepherd can be. When the mirror is turned away, he comes to a halt, and then moves to sit down on the steps just before her, an earnest gaze steered in her direction as he listens. Then, puzzlement. A key?

"Good thing I got the locks changed at some point beforehand," Joseph says with a little wonder, shaking his head. The water he'd collected from inside is offered to her, even as he's muttering, "That's ridiculous. You'd reckon people had better things to do with their time."

"From what I know of Humanis First, it seems that nothing in life is more important than getting rid of the likes of me." Rebecca accepts the water and takes a swallow, the bitter of the pills she's taken washing down her throat. She instinctively reaches up and checks to make sure she hasn't a nosebleed, a look of relief crossing her face as she finds no blood. "I can have a sketch made up of the three who were here. It's at least more than we had before."

Rebecca puts the mirror back into her purse and starts to stand up, "Sorry there wasn't more that I could do. Honestly, even if we find them, I'm not certain that what I've seen could be useful in any sort of court. But, perhaps we can catch them in the act of doing something else like this." As she rises, she suddenly gets dizzy and starts to fall backwards.

Joseph gets to his feet around the same time Rebecca is, hands smoothing out his slacks and opening his mouth to speak— before the younger woman is, out the corner of his eye, swooning back towards the concrete edges of the rounded stairs. Words promptly lost in a breathed out curse that Joseph might deny later, he's quick to get a hold of her, an arm around her shoulders and easing her down.

It doesn't even take the contact of skin-to-skin. Something is triggered, something far more invasive than Rebecca's mirror visions - it shields her eyes and her ears from the world around her, renders her detached from it in every way but touch. She can still taste and smell the windless afternoon summer air in Greenwich village, but what she sees and hears is entirely different.

The night time sky is full of smog and stars, and police lights flash blue, red, blue, red. There's the sound of foot steps, mutterings. Though she can't feel it, Rebecca can turn her head and see that she's lying down upon the pavement of a sidewalk, her leg thrown over a curb. A bus stop is lit up nearby, a cop car is parked, two distant figures talking.

The dream-entity of herself that Rebecca rides within sits up, looks down at herself. Crimson, is what she sees, deep red that stiffens the front of her clothing, knife slashes through her blouse. No pain, no sense of cold, no nothing - just the horrific sight of stained cloth and the flashes of torn skin beneath it. Her gaze travels out, but not far out. There's a chalk line drawn onto the ground, comical in a film noir detective movie kind of way. Here lies the spot of the deceased, and it follows her shape exactly from when she had been lying down - until she moves them, they follow the akimbo angles of her legs as well.

"Are you dead?"

Rebecca is forced to look towards the source of the voice. A young woman, blonde, her hands on the handles of a bike with a flat tired, peers down at her. "You probably should be. Look, it's all arranged." The bike falls with a clatter, and the young woman comes to crouch in front of her. "Just another statistic. Mark it off on the tally."

Sunlight suddenly comes flooding back, the sounds of Greenwich Village. An interrupted sentence, just next to her, Joseph Sumter saying, "— left it in my damn coat, could you please call an ambulance?" A couple of people have stopped; a young Latino man is obligingly dialing on his cellphone, and Joseph remains kneeling just beside Rebecca, a hand covering her's.

She would think it a dream, but it was not like any dream she's ever had. Rebecca takes a moment to try and remember where she was and how she came to be here. Still somewhat disoriented from her own reflective vision, this other thing toys with her thoughts. She sits upright and her free hand immediately moves to check the front of her blouse for the blood she saw before. There's no flashing lights, no emergency personnel, no girl on a bike telling her she should be dead.

The word 'ambulance' drifts past her confusion and into her ears and she shakes her head. "I'll be fine. I always am. I just stood sooner than I should have." Her eyes look at that Pastor as though questioning what she has seen and if he saw it too. She's never had anything like that happen to her in her life.

The bystander flicks his cellphone shut before Joseph can protest, but the pastor only thins his mouth into a line of disapproval, and moves his grip on her hand to a more steadying grasp on her shoulder, remaining kneeling beside her. "You sure? You take your time getting up, don't want a repeat performance, now," he says, reaching to pick up the water bottle and handing it over. But he hesitates, somewhat quizzical, glancing almost self-consciously towards the couple of gawkers who have since given them some room.

No lie, there was something familiar about her collapse. Or at least, whatever ensued. Hesitantly, he asks, "What happened, exactly? Did you just faint?"

Rebecca isn't going to stand up just yet. She's still getting her bearings. The water is accepted, opened and half of it consumed before she offers a response. "I think I just stood up too fast. I guess I fainted." She doesn't mention the dream, taking it for what she thinks it must be.. a dream. She only takes a few more moments before she attempts to stand again and this time manages without incident.

"Sorry for worrying you so." She's glad to have at least warned him of what could happen. The last thing she needs to try and explain is how she cracked her head open on the sidewalk of a church.

Joseph moves to give what assistance she's willing to take, taking a step back once she's back on her feet and steady. He takes a breath, lets it out— and whatever had him asking for more information, is summarily let go of too. "Alright," he says, allowing himself to be convinced that she doesn't immediately need to be rushed to hospital. "You didn't smack your head or anything, luckily. Look— I know there's small chance of whatever you did today helpin' out the church, but if you can— maybe get a hold of whoever these guys are, what they look like, at least I'll know to watch out for 'em."

Reaching into her purse, she pulls out her card. "I'm sure there are others you can call for police work, but if you ever need anything detected or have need for my gift again, please call me." She offers him the card and with that, she steps down and away from the church, only pausing once for a look back before moving down the street and back to the precinct.


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