Participants:
Scene Title | Arise |
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Synopsis | The world breaks everyone, and afterward, some are strong at the broken places. —Ernest Hemingway |
Date | May 12, 2014 |
Chinatown Tattoo Parlor
She hadn't intended to ever find herself doing this again. But Elisabeth finds herself in need of an inking. Chinatown is always the best place to go for such things, and as the brunette walks with Isabelle, she is looking for a particular place. "I don't know if the person works here in this world," she admits. "If she does…. She's a chromakinetic. If she doesn't, the parlor here is really good anyway and I'll have it done the old-fashioned way." She hasn't shown the image to Isabelle yet, but now she pulls the sheet from her pocket and hands it to the pyrokinetic. ((https://i.pinimg.com/474x/7c/2a/70/7c2a709b1abae04e5869dbaee8803202--crow-tattoos-raven-tattoo.jpg))
"There are two lines of lyrics that go with it…. Maybe you can help me decide which one?" Elisabeth asks, a little uncertain.
Tattoos, she loved them and what better time than when a friend asks you for company and so Isabelle walks next to Liz with a sway to her hips, hazel eyes taking in the image with a intent stare, you have to make sure it’s worth getting on your body forever. “Color wizard huh?” An eyebrow arches as Izzy takes the page and studies it, “If the artist is good then this will look amazing.” Voicing her support she hands the page back and slips a hand into the back pocket of her black jeans, “What are you thinking? Lyric wise.” Keeping in step with the audiokinetic, the brunette looks up at the sky above the skyscrapers.
“I’ve been thinking of getting one myself. The itch and all, you helped it start itching again.” A grin on the woman’s face as she searches for the parlor though Liz knows where it is. Isa thinks irrationally for a moment about getting Shaw’s name on her boob but quickly decides that too trashy.
Maybe her inner thigh.
"Ever heard the song 'Falling Forever?'" The question isn't perhaps specific enough. Elisabeth elaborates, "There was a version done by Paradise Lost in the early '90s… but the one that more comes to mind is the 2010 song by Mutiny Within." Neither are her usual cup of tea, though. "The phrase fits, either way. The other line is 'Take these broken wings and learn to fly' — which… technically I could also put under the angel."
“Can’t say I have,” said thoughtfully as she mulls over Liz’s options. “Broken wings, it’s sad but uplifting. That one.” The pyro smiles faintly and looks over her shoulder briefly, she’s been waiting for one of those Hiro visits now. Eager to train.
“I think maybe something to commemorate moving from home to here, ashes in a spiral with a woman in the middle.” The tattoo image manifesting in her mind suddenly and she smiles at the thought. Isa is in a relaxed mood today, the flask in her backpocket not touched yet though she’s craving a cigarette something fierce, something she said she would quit if she was living in a ‘proper utopia’ and such though they could cure lung cancer with a snap of their fingers so was there any risk? “It’s wild what you can get use to.”
"I like that idea for you," Elisabeth admits. "It fits moving from there to here, also… being reborn, which you've also done. At least from my perspective." She grins a little. "As to sad… No. it just makes me… wistful, I guess. Waiting for this moment to arise. I feel like I do that a lot."
Rebirth, like a phoenix. What Shaw called her. That nickname gave her a jolt of joy and she continues walking with Liz, “Well I guess I have. You’ve been evading death left and right what do we call that?” Looking around, “Let’s get inside.”
She’s not nervous being on the street outwardly, maybe she’s just anxious to get their ink. Or maybe Isabelle is nervous because what if Pinehearst has found out about her, what if Magnes.. The paranoia is quell by a calm inhale and exhale, those thoughts shut off like a lightswitch.
"Insanity," she retorts. Although Liz sees the joy, she's not entirely sure why it's there. She likes it, though. Stepping through the door to the tattoo parlor, she looks around. There are several artists at work, and she doesn't immediately see the young woman she's looking for but she's already said that wasn't an issue.
She waits for the person at the counter to look up and smiles faintly, retrieving the image from Isa. "If you have an Evo to do the work, we would like that. If not, the artist you feel best suited to this style."
She looks at Isabelle. "Do you want to do that one today with me?" Liz grins. "My treat," She coaxes.
Isabelle doesn't refuse gifts. Never. As they enter the place Isa feels at home there, misfits. Her people always. Nodding her head at one of the artists she peers around looking at the shop, it looks good to her, clean and professional. She's gotten work done in worse places and those memories cause a pang in her heart for those teenage days.
“Liz, you’re sweet. Can't wait.”
Isabelle trails a finger down the counter as she recounts what she wants on her side to the artist and waits for Liz to show her artwork, she figures they’ll either go at the same time or one after the other. “My first tattoo was a dotted line on my big toe,” a rueful grin on her face, “This is a way better idea,” shutting her leather jacket off, revealing the other tattoos spiraling up her body.
"Hey, if we're getting it done with needles, lady, misery loves company," Elisabeth laughs in return. As the older man studies the image Elisabeth handed him and listens to Isabelle's requirements, he tilts his head and calls into the back of the shop. To Liz, the young woman is a familiar face in a different world. But she shows no recognition — she was sincerely hoping for this particular artist, however.
"Cost more to have Evo do," he informs her in a tone that indicates he's testing her. And Elisabeth grins slightly, having haggled enough in Chinatown to have an idea how this works. She goes to work bargaining, appearing to enjoy herself immensely. Izzy has only ever seen glimpses of the artwork on the audiokinetic's body, an angel's wing here and there behind the strap of a tanktop. When the bargain is struck, however, Liz beckons to her friend to follow her and the artist into the other room.
As she strips off her shirt, she was prepared for today because she's wearing a string bikini beneath the top. Elisabeth's back is bared to the artist and her friend without a hint of modesty — she has a baby she nursed in public; the bikini is for the artist's sake, not her own. She figured stripping down totally wouldn't exactly be what anyone expected, not in a legit place of business. As she sits in the chair, though, there are two exquisitely rendered tats on her back. One graces the curve of her lower left back, an intricate Celtic knot with the Latin phrase "In aeternum" in beautifully ornate script around it. "That one was my first," she tells Isabelle quietly. "It was … on his headstone when I thought he was gone."
The angel on her right shoulder, however, is the larger of the two and immediately draws the eye to the right shoulder blade. The artist pauses, wariness entering her features as she perhaps recognizes the work, but she seems puzzled by it as well. She studies the battered blonde angel, who has taken a knee and braces one hand on a bloodied sword with its point in the ground, black wings with feathers edged in sky-blue and silver — colors that inks never really have. The expression on the angel's features, Elisabeth's own features somewhat idealized and rendered in perfect delineation, is a haunted kind of determination.
"Sit," the young Asian woman gestures to Isabelle. She's not the type to ask questions, even when she wants to. "It costs more, but it's faster. Describe it to me again while I work on this one."
“Runs in our friendship then,” a quirk of a smile at Richard having a grave that was empty. Isa watches as she removes her clothes and studies the tattoos, “Serious ink I see.” Isa doesn’t have any that Liz hasn’t seen.. Maybe one or two. The woman forever in a tank top stretches her arms out and nods along with her, “They’re beautiful.” A stick figure roping a tightrope, balancing it’s heart and mind is prominent on the pyro’s left arm. “Got this when I was eighteen in a effort to ground myself. Didn’t work,” the devilish grin on her face widening.
Sitting Isabelle goes through the detail of telling the artist her idea and she relaxes as the artist goes to work, lines of color swirling on her right side, dark greys, blacks, red, yellow and orange sketch the outline before the filling in process begins, squinting her eyes Isabelle is in awe of the process.
“I might miss the needles.” She comments with a laugh before turning her gaze to Liz, “You think about him often? Still?” Isabelle’s own thoughts going to her Cardinal who was left behind in her home timeline. “The bastard’s face just kinda hovers in my dreams.”
The reason for the artist's interest in the ink may become apparent as she works on the outline of the star-filled blackbird that Elisabeth brought. The complex image begins to show quickly against Liz's pale skin, and for someone who knows body art the way Isabelle does, it begins to niggle that the artist of the angel and the artist of the blackbird have extremely similar styles… and handwriting, when it comes time to place the script. The bird is smaller than the angel, but it balances it out so that the images don't look off-kilter.
As Elisabeth sits for the young woman's work, she looks toward Isabelle. She rarely lets anyone see past the mask — whatever her real feelings on most subjects, she only shares what she wants to. For this, she lets those walls down and allows her friend to see the loss that splinters through her. There is a reason she hasn't dated or even looked seriously at a man in all the time Isabelle's known her. "Every time I look into her eyes, it hits me all over," she admits softly. And she doesn't even know about what happened to Cardinal in Virus. She didn't see it. It's her own Richard that she is thinking of when Isabelle asks the question.
"It's… worse now in some ways." She bites her lip. "A… message came through from home. He survived the last fight. But… as expected, they've thought we were dead all this time. And I… don't know if the return message will ever be received. I can't know unless or until we make it home."
Stiffening at those emotions pulling at her heart, she frowns over towards Liz, “Wait until she starts talking, then you’ll feel like he’s right there.” A quip in the midst of the sadness, the brunette listens as she watches the ink take place and notes the artist’s similarities, how strange.. Shaking her head a little she tries not to think about her Richard, the other Richard, it’s impossible.
“You will get home Liz, I promise.” They’ve made these promises before, Isa still means it. Cracking a smile and moving minutely so as to not distract, “If you don’t get home who will smack him upside the head when he’s being an idiot?” Or steal his cigarettes and be a nuance. Richard and Isabelle’s relationship firmly grounded in friendship with a touch of something other. Those days had past near the end of her time at home but that bonded them even closer. She misses her friend. “Aurora will be lucky, when she gets home and gets to meet her dad.”
When she starts talking? Elisabeth has to chuckle softly at that. "Just keep an eye on her when you're around. He was always dead certain one of the kids was going to just vanish," she snickers. "When I said that wasn't going to happen, he demanded to know how I knew that for sure — they are, after all, his spawn." It makes her giggle to remember that conversation, and the laughter once again conceals the gut-wrenching loss that she still feels.
Feeling the dark eyes of the tattoo artist on her, Liz goes still again although it's clear that the young woman doesn't need that, really. The detail and depth of color that she imparts to the skin are truly impressive — usually older ink looks a little faded next to new ink, but not in this case. The sky-blue and silver colors in the angel's pure, rich black wings are just as brilliant as the stars set into the shadow blackbird. When the mirror is held up so she can see it, Elisabeth's smile is radiant though there's a flash of tears. The bird has many layers of meaning. But that was always obvious to Isabelle.
The artist turns to Izzy. "Where did you want to place this one?" she asks easily. "I can see several places where a silhouette rising out of a mist of ashes would draw the eye. The angle just depends on how large you want it to sit on your skin."
“Vanish hahaha well,” she shrugs at that because it’s probable knowing that line. Isa’s eyes travel the bird and smile in appreciation of the art before she takes off her tank top and points to her side, “Just here, a bit of a spiral on my back shoulder maybe, whatever you decide looks best.” Isabelle gets comfortable to allow the woman to work, she doesn’t tense there are no needles and a piece of the dark haired woman already misses the pain of getting it the old fashioned way.
“Look at us getting tattoos like a couple of college girls on a bender in Vegas.”
Elisabeth grins wickedly. "I have no idea if I even went on benders in college," she laughs. Those years are erased courtesy of a bullet to the brain. She doesn't pull her shirt back on as yet; something occurred to her. But she'll wait until the artist is done with Isabelle.
Tilting her head, the Asian woman studies the location and then nods. "That'll work well," she agrees on the placement. Her hands are light as they touch Izzy's shoulder and the image begins to take shape.
Liz watches it happen, always fascinated by this particular ability. "Oooh, that's really going to pop, Isa." She's careful with names here. "It almost looks like a tornado that way." The silhouette takes shape within the spiraling lines, head thrown back and arms raised to the sky as they seem to be dissipating into the wind above the form. Or perhaps they are reintegrating — both interpretations fit, which Elisabeth actually finds brilliant in the way the artist handles it. "She could be coming back together or falling apart, depending on which way you personally see it. Like one of those visual riddles, you know?"
Watching in the mirror with a half lidded gaze the pyrokinetic smiles a weak one as the artist works, she really believes they are all special, so unique. This world celebrated that, improved upon it. Isabelle in that moment appreciated the utopia for the briefest of moments but that feeling sombers as she remembers Thalia, Colin.. The other her. Closing her eyes as if she’s deep in thought but it’s more to hide the anguish in her eyes.
“This is therapeutic, thanks for asking me to come.” Once not trusting of the blonde who she thought was a cop and now friends, family with all their connections and things they’ve gone through. “We’ll make it.” A promise again. Isa doesn’t want Liz to forget it.
"It is therapeutic," Elisabeth agrees quietly. Her father always said family doesn't have to be blood — it's what you make it. And for all that she feels alone and very lonely at times, she recognizes that there are people here who she will always consider family. Clearing her throat, she says, "We just have to believe, right?"
Glancing up at the artist, she asks, "I'd like you add something when you're done, please?" It's not like it'll be hard… and Liz finds every penny spent today worth it. The extra script up her spine, and the second line of lyrics beneath the embattled guardian already on her shoulder take no real extra time at all. "To remind us both that it's just a matter of time," she tells Isabelle when the ink is finished.
You were only waiting for this moment to arise