Participants:
| Scene Title | Asshole Supreme |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | BOOM gathers to discuss intel and upcoming plans. |
| Date | May 2, 2019 |
Cat's Cradle: The Oracle Room
In Cat's Cradle, in the Oracle room, Monica has called a meeting. She's already there with a drink in hand. Just the one hand. It's a striking difference, to go from having a fancy cybernetic prosthetic to having no arm again. But these people knew her during the war— they're some of the only people who might be used to seeing her this way.
However she feels about it, she seems ready to get down to business. She has notes. There's a whiteboard. She only needs the rest of BOOM to arrive.
The sounds of something grinding on the floor above enters the space as a red glow seems to warm the wood and the shape of a red mist formed Eve falls through the ceiling with an open mouth and no sound coming out. Twisting in the air the former seer's crimson skin flickers and a cackle roars in reverse as her corporeal form snaps into place as she hits the large pillows that litter the room.
"Oof! Wheee!"
Poof poof.
Red mist and lightning rises from the woman's form while equally blood red eyes find her friend, she's on time. That would make sense since she lives upstairs. "Hey Moni-Moni!" Leaping from her place on the pillows to lean forward and stare at where her cybernetic arm use to be. Eve's tattered black trench coat is on its last leg but at least she's covered and her skates are upstairs.
"Your fancy arm…" she frowns. There was a time when she would have seen this before. "How are you?"
The door opens and Chess steps in with a bag full of Chinese food, picked up somewhere between the Japanese haven she’s calling home these days and the Cradle. The iconic red containers, visible through opaque plastic bags with red ‘thank you’ printed on the side, create an aromatic medley that the true connoisseurs of Chinese-American hole-in-the-wall cuisine can identify readily: orange chicken, chow mein, mongolian beef, egg rolls, fried rice.
“Fam,” is uttered lightly from the young millennial. The light tone comes in stark contrast to the grief that’s been reawakened, thanks to proverbial salt rubbed in the never-healed wound. Thanks to a certain Miles that isn’t the right Miles.
Her eyes dart over to Monica, and a contrite look pulls at her features. She looks down again, busying herself with taking out the containers of food and plastic forks and chopsticks.
Sure as he’d fall into a baited trap nose first, Luther arrives as the last of the gathering. He’s brought little else but his person and his appetite. Well, and maybe an opinion or two to share. He finds his way to Chess’ side, a light half-twist of a smile foisted on her. “You’re an angel,” he says in regards to the food she’s brought. But also in general, because come on. Not even a second glance to the way Eve’s appeared, although he eyeballs the tattered trench coat. Mental notes made there for the state of the battered article of clothing. Which leads him to Monica’s condition finally, and he makes note of the missing limb with a frown.
No questions though, not yet. First, sitting. Questions later.
"I'm fine," Monica says to Eve. It's flat and probably a lie, but it's one she expects Eve to roll with. She doesn't look at her— she doesn't look at anyone as they come in.
She doesn't want to see the looks.
"We need to consolidate what we know," she says, jumping right into the topic she called them all here for, instead of bothering with greetings. "We know from Kam that The Dragon," she says as she scrawls the words on the whiteboard and draws a circle around, "is some sort of uber powerful entity that she is no longer holding onto. And it's probably out in the world, although I don't think it's bent on destroying everything because all signs point to it being totally capable of doing that and it hasn't yet so. It has other plans."
Adam Monroe is written next to it, also circled. "We know he has a connection to the Dragon. We also know he's an asshole. Praxis," she says, jotting things down as she recites, "Clones. Ghost Shadows. Refrain. And, as an extra piece of fun, Richard mentioned that he's gathering some Evo-Supremacists to do some shenanigans with." Group of Assholes is what she dubs them. She doesn't know if they have a formal name but this one will do. "So what else do we know?"
Eve's eyes dance as she looks over Monica again but she doesn't press it.
For now there's a Boomer and FOOD. Almost as good as explosives which Boomer was inherently. "Nomnoms. Is there orange chicken?" Eagerly, or chow mein. BBQ pork, she wasn't picky. Reaching forward for a plate and container to dish some food out before curling back up on a pillow, her special pillow AKA the pillow she allows to get signed from her outburst of crimson energy, sporadic but steady.
Monica with the graphics and start of this has Eve leaning in while furiously chewing up noodles, "Maybe it's not reached full power, half mast." Spoken with a mouthful the pale woman squints at the whiteboard and nods her head sending sparks raining down around her. The other names written on the board, familiar. "He's been funneling money through his various fronts, tiny holes tiny tiny holes, big profits over centuries. I don't think people even realize they are apart of his web until it's too late, sometimes they never find out." Thinking back on that dream she had with Delia.. "He's been trying to learn something. About himself. About us. He started with the Nazis and their science fairies. Projects… Hydra and Heinsiberg.
The dream lingered sometimes in her mind, that terrible gas. The feeling of dying, "Praxis' science fairies must be working on these now." To whatever aim she doesn't know. Yet. "Oh it's… there. Somewhere. We know The Dragon was Banished by the Company when we were either all little babes or not even born yet. All memories erased, total redaction." Rubbing her forehead, "The secret lies in the brainpan, in the past. Snksnk." Eve shovels more food in her mouth, sighing as her belly is filled with grease and love this food was made with love damn it.
"Japan!" Eve's face is excited as she claps a hand down in front of her, "I went to college, a few months ago! RUSH WEEK WOOHOO! Go Tigers!" The tigers were not the mascots of Brooklyn College and Eve was not allowed to rush at any sort of Greek house. "Met a lady, Karen she has lots of notes on The Plague, thinks of him as the Kensei myth. I had to burst her bubble but there are things there. Dig sites, cavessss, historical thing. I forgot to have Miles take me to one of them when we went to there recently…." brow furrowed the woman scratches the back of her head. "More pieces there, also sushi." Wide grin. She loved sushi. "What.. did Kam… the precious host say exactly?"
Head tilted.
Chess has made her own plate, deftly using the chopsticks to eat the chowmein neither messily nor overly neatly — this is family, the most proper manners (if she has them) not on display. She listens to Eve and glances at Monica, perhaps for a translation of metaphor-speak. Her eyes sparkle a bit with amusement, though, and her fondness for Eve is clear.
And then there’s the name Miles.
Her eyes drop and she sets her plate away from her, no longer hungry. Instead she goes to where the liquor bottles rest, to help herself to a glass. Without turning to look at them, she says, “That the Dragon will destroy everything, Kensei was the only one who could stop it, that if she told us about it, it would spread like some sort of STD,” she says, splashing whiskey into a glass. “They told me that knowledge is power when I was a kid. Turns out knowledge is herpes.”
She turns, leaning against the table, taking a hard swallow of the whiskey in her glass. “And then we blew her up but she started to put herself back together again until she was shot in the head.”
Somewhere in all of this chatter, Luther has gathered himself a pile of food. He's listening, watching, nodding slowly, eating quickly. His gaze skims over the words as they're written, but they do linger on the name Adam Monroe a bit longer than the rest. "The Asshole Supreme," rumbles the man, absolutely no tint of admiration - or fear - behind it.
Luther turns to Eve, making a small motion with his chopsticks in the air. "He showed up a few times in your visions. That one with the army, and… And he fuckin' cut your head off that one time? More than enough cameos by this guy to make it worth our trouble to figure out more about him and what he's got to do with all this. Even without Evo-Supremacists." He narrows his gaze at Group of Assholes.
The man's gaze shifts back to Eve, but cuts abruptly to Chess at the mention of Miles. An inscrutable grunt escapes Luther as he slides another mouthful of noodles into him, keeping an ear to what Chess says and an eye on what she does. "So the Dragon," he says after a swallows, "is that thing with the gold eyes. It takes over some host… gives them some crazy set of superpowers." Another checked glance goes to Eve and Monica. "And Kensei is the hero-knight who's going to slay it and save us all?"
He sets his half-eaten plate down, grabbing up a drink. "I don't much believe the stories. We got to find out more facts. We're going to be dealing with fighting more than one front. Question is, which one first? And how're we going to burn the heads we cut off of this monster to make sure they don't grow back?" Luther looks to Chess for a long moment more, then back to Monica. "And how to we keep the other clones off Chess, Alix and Kimberly in the process?"
While the others talk, Monica takes notes in a messy collection of circles connected with lines. But it's all there, in one way or another.
"Japan has more than just legends to uncover. Praxis is there just like they're here. Poking at Yamagato. Adam is Praxis. So we need to dig into that, too. Plus, I have a contact in Japan that might be able to help us. Travel papers, transport, that kind of thing. Asi," she says to Chess, since she met her. Sort of. "And we keep Chess and the others safe by sticking together. Whatever we jump into over there, whatever angles we follow, if the other Chestras show up, then we know we're barking up the right tree. Or at least a tree worth barking up."
Trouble, for Monica, has always been a good sign. Which probably says a lot about her life choices.
"So I think we should go. I'm unemployed, seems like a good time for a vacation."
"He did slice my head off and The Dragon brought me back." Still strange, the notion that Adam is the way to stop The Dragon makes her wrinkle her nose, it goes against everything she's thought. "Why would be tell me to speak of it then… speak little herald." Eve whispers and looks down, maybe, "Maybe I've been misinterpreting what he meant…"
But then Monica drops….
"Field trip!!" Eve punches her fist into the air and jumps to her feet picking up a marker to write on the board Hokkaido, Japan. Beaming the former seer turns to look at her friends, "This is where the science fairy Dr. Adrienne Allen tracked down the roots of the Dragon, which I believe she was looking for as the First of us." Tapping her fingers along the board and a hum, "I got to talk to her thanks to the help of a valiant and handsome Sir Knight that Moni knows," waggling her eyebrows towards her assassin friend. "She was creating a map, tracing our lineage as a species. I think there are answers in Hokkaido, so let's go to Japan!"
ROAD TRIP ROAD TRIP. Eve loves sake.
"Praxis.. his foothold in this world. You're right Moni, Japan is calling our names like one of my tubas." Looking down at her hands, "I'm a bit too unstable for the convenient travel and also.. if Adam knows that I'm boarding a flight to Japan he might be into what we're onto." Leaning forward Eve looks decidedly not at Chess, "I have an idea on how me and the Chesstras can slip in unnoticed, right under their noses." A snicker, Chess is going to hate this.
Also not this.
"She also told me about that Gemini symbol… remember Boomer? There was an experiment.. and they were giving people abilities from it.. like siphoning from someone else. My visions surrounding you and your sisters… and Adam.. and the Zimmerman triplets. With the golden eyes… I think you have something to do with it." Eve delivers this before she even touches the fact that she wants to ask her best friends alternate version of the love of her life to go to Japan.
Chess’ dark eyes glance off each face as they speak, Luther with his skepticism, Monica with her pragmatism, and Eve with her boundless enthusiasm. “Do we ask Yamagato’s blessing or am I sneaking out?” she asks Monica, given she’s living in Yamagato Park on their dime for their protection.
Eve gets a look when she studiously looks anywhere but at Chess, but really, it could be any crackpot idea brewing in the woman’s mind that she knows Chess will side-eye. It happens a lot. But the Gemini symbol’s mention draws Chess’ brows upward. “So it does have to do with us after all,” she says. “Who’re the Zimmerman triplets?” she murmurs to Monica, but then she remembers something Eve had said.
“So the Mother you were talking about when you showed me that — that’s the Dragon? I need a thesaurus to keep all this shit straight,” she says, taking another sip of sake. At least there’ll be that in Japan, if not answers.
“Yamagato doesn’t have a hold on you,” Luther points out with a slight frown to Chess, “but they have been pretty good about all this. Not enough to stick around and find out what they’re hiding though, especially with what they did.” He works his jaw, the discomfort about what happened to Kam evident.
Eve’s revelations and enthusiasm get another indulging sort of sigh from Luther, and he settles further back into his seat. “Well I’m not sneaking in, not with this pretty face. But… Japan, huh? A vacation is in order.” Never mind that he had spent a month and a half rehabbing. Grabbing his plate, he starts to refill it, because why not. “So we’ll just come at it from all the angles. Divide,” he notes with a heaping scoop of orange chicken, “and conquer.”
"You don't have to sneak out. They don't need to know what we're doing, of course, but there's no reason you can't tell them you're going. Visiting our friend Asi," she offers as far as a reason Yamagato would buy, "we'll need her help anyway, if we need to move around freely."
So it won't even be that much of a lie.
"The Zimmerman triplets are Niki, Barbara and Tracy. Niki married my cousin DL. Tracy is god knows where. Barbara works for Yamagato, too. They didn't know each other existed for a long time, so their origins have always been… in question, let's say." That they are also hooked into Adam brings a frown to Monica's face. But all the more reason to hunt all this stuff down.
"So, Japan, here we come?"
There's a small smile and dip of her head, "Let's settle in The Dragon for final nickname. DR if we wanna be super incognito," which Eve is very good at!!
"We also freed Niki ten years ago… along with Adam and this very tall Huntress and Niki was actually Jessica and Mohinder was Sylar but that was Gabriel and you know-" Eve stops herself and gives a sheepish look and a roll of her eyes, hehe.
Nodding her head excitedly to Monica's question, "They won't know what hit em." Adam, Praxis, not the Japanese government surely. "As for my and the Chesstras noble ride, Boomer don't hate me but Bunny- Miles is the only way." Eve looks at her younger friend, it's fine it's fine.
“You rescued Adam?” Chess repeats, brow lifting. “Can we go back in time and slap your former self?”
But then there’s other news to process — Miles.
Her expression shifts for a moment before she schools it into a more neutral position — or tries to. It’s mostly flat. She reaches for the container of orange chicken to add some to her plate. “You can ask him, I guess,” she says with a lift of one shoulder. “I wouldn’t get your hopes up — and you need to warn him before having him meet Kimberly.” That might be the sort of thing that Eve forgets to do, after all.
Waving the chopsticks in his hand in a small circle over his takeout, Luther shakes his head. “Going back in time will just get things really more fucked up than fixed, trust me.” At least this time there’s no chopped off heads being mentioned.
Only a certain teleporter. From another time. Another dimension.
There was a moratorium on the topic of Miles, wasn’t there? Luther shoots a short look towards Chess, then to Eve, the faint shake of his head while he’s in mid-chew of orange chicken and chow mein indicating he’s staying mum on the Miles situation. But after a swallow, he blows out a rough huff and turns back to Monica at the scribbling board. “Japan it is. We are definitely going to need some dossiers on all these names gettin’ flung around.”
“But first… let’s finish up dinner, yeah?” He sinks his chopsticks back into the mini mountain of noodles on his plate, tucking in and putting it away.