Participants:
| Scene Title | Like A Polaroid Picture |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Vincent is updated about a situation, wherein he gives his marching orders. |
| Date | September 19, 2010 |
Manhattan: 26 Federal Plaza, DoEA HQ
Midtown: it's decimated.
The setting sun paves ruined streets in shades of gold and glints fine off metal struts recurved from the initial blast. Or later collapse.
Vincent considers them from afar as he sips his fourth cup of coffee today, contents easily as black as his stare despite the warm oranges and reds swathed matte through the office and across his suit. Life is hard. But the view from his office is fairly spectacular, so there is that.
The great metal Department seal mounted on his wall watches him thumb the line back into the ass of the clunky phone on his desk, then. He also turns his cell phone back on, screen held away and then closer when his stare is slow to focus. "You can come in," he tells whatever button he depresses as an afterthought on the landline, the same hand scuffed under his nose before he sweeps two file folders and a bottle of pills into his first drawer and sinks down into his chair. The drawer closes with a gliding whunk.
Moments later, there's a demure tap of knuckles to door, before Agent Sebastian is moving inside, spaghetti-straight blonde hair bouncing in as rhythmic swing as a pony's tail. There's a flow of continuity to her movements, like not only did she not stop at the door when she knocked, she also walked in this same clipclop pace from the NYPD HQ, bearing this file that she grips two handedly, straight into Vincent's office. Horses and wolves pace themselves similarly, like they'll go on forever.
"Agent Lazzaro," she greets, in her usual understated brightness, creepily professional like one expects artificial intelligence to be. A newish addition to the Office of Intelligence and Analysis, recruited a few weeks before the Registration overhaul, or also termed to be, around when shit hit the fan.
"Evening," says Vincent in his usual understated flatness, possibly to cover for the fact that he was watching her walk and has just forgotten her last name. Again. Slightly baffled by his own level of distraction, he manages to quash a shake of his head at nothing and looks to the file she has in her jaws instead. A vague gesture encompasses either of the two chairs positioned across from him. Have a seat, Sebastian.
Sebastian. There it is. Somewhat relieved, he straightens himself and his posture out with a steep-drawn breath and click-clicks a pen that's found its way in under his right hand. "What've you got for me?"
Oblivious to name forgetting— because she never would— the agent grabs the back of the opposite chair and draws it out, sitting down and planting both heels on the ground as opposed to a prim crossing of her legs. "Abigail Beauchamp is currently under arrest for failing to register as an Evolved," she says, and he prrrobably knows some of this — he probably signed the request for information from Agent Parkman, but it's something of a running leap. "She's admitting to willfully cheating her Registration test, and claims that she spontaneously manifested a pyro mimic ability despite coming up as Non-Evo in previous testing.
"Inconsistent with unmanifested Evolveds who show the SLC marker. But," and this is probably what's more important to Sebastian, allowing a small pause to level in her voice as she lays her file flat on Vincent's desk, flipping it over as a guide for her eyes, "she has also stated that her Registration officer knew about her circumstances, and cheated for her out of sympathy. Do you know a Detective Christopher Nash?"
Abigail Beauchamp, known Healer registered, turned normal and unregistered, then turned fiery menace and forcibly registered after cheating a — second registration. The aplomb with which Vincent absorbs this alone would be remarkable if not for the fact that 'aplomb' is kind of his specialty. His brows lift, but only slightly. He doesn't look at Sebastian to see whether or not she's being serious — not even sarcastically.
She always is.
Instead he exchanges his pen for a pair of rimless glasses, left hand held out in request for whatever there is of relevance that she doesn't require as an immediate reference. "We had some limited interaction prior to my resignation from the force. She told you he did it out of sympathy?"
"She didn't cite any monetary favours or otherwise, which I don't think means there were none," Sebastian amends, plucking out a few clipped sheaths of paper and handing them over — Abby's statement. "She said she was scared about undergoing more tests if she kept things legal." A raise of pale eyebrows shows that Sebastian doesn't totally blame her for the sentiment, at least. "So she cited her previous record with the NYPD as a Healer when it came to finding someone to help her, and something about not feeling very guilty if Nash got caught with her." Another twitch of a smirk.
Maybe she likes Abby a little. Not that a case isn't a case. Because it is, and if the possessiveness with which Sebastian gripped the file upon entering is to be of any indication, she's keen.
"Ouch," says Vincent, with mock sympathy for Abigail's cited absence of it. Because he didn't get to be Internal Affairs without taking a certain sadistic pleasure from the misfortune of cops sloppier than him.
Statement collected and skimmed, he's quiet for the time it takes him to read it over in greater detail, if not completely from start to finish. "Detective Christopher Nash, philanthropist," evidently does not sit with him. At least, not well, or he wouldn't keep going back to it. "Okay, well. If he's letting the Human Torch slip through the cracks I'm not inclined to risk letting him go on long enough to catch him in the act. If we go ahead and shake him other names may fall out, anyway."
Sebastian nods, once, because once is enough, a hand up to push straightened-to-punishment blonde locks behind an ear. "I went ahead and took the liberty of pulling his Registration record," she adds, a hand out to flick over some more pages, mostly data. "DHS got a fax just a week or so ago, that one of their red flags came up in the system. Monica Dawson? Affiliations with the terrorist group Phoenix, although there was no confirmation about whether she was a non or not. She's Registered as one now, by Nash. It might be worth bringing up, or keeping in mind, at least.
"How do you want him?"
"Goodness."
Oh dear. Etcetera. Affiliations with Phoenix. Vincent is quiet again for a span, then:
"Cooperative," probably isn't what she was actually asking, but he asserts black optimism all the same. He has more papers to flip through, so he flips through them, paying less attention to these than the ones that came before them. "We already have our press piece for the month. I want him to stop, I want names, and I want details on everyone who approaches him from here on out. If he cooperates I'm willing to deal. If he isn't we'll rape him with the media and make it a twofer." Lazzaro sips his coffee. So it goes.
Goodness and other such minor exclamations are watched for with alert attention, a minor shift of expression beneath Sebastian's mask of professionalism. Goodness isn't wrong. And his next words are close enough to what she was asking for Sebastian not to ask for clarity, her smile that of Mona Lisa, glassy, and not insincere. "Understood." She gets up out of her chair, putting her folder back together in primly efficient movements and tucking it back beneath her wing. "I'll be sure to keep you updated."
No goodbye or have a good evening or say hello to your weird CIA friend or your ex-wife whatever is less awkward to say from me. Information dispensed and marching orders given, Sebastian takes her blunt nails, freckles and two inches heels towards his door.
Vincent pauses in his papers to watch her leave, what with his wife all ex and his CIA friend all weird. He says, "Thank you, Agent Sebastian," when she's nearly out the door, and for the briefest of suspicious flickers, he might be watching her for another reason. A little too warily intent until his office door is closed and he's free to scuff at his stubble collection on his way to resting his face in one hand.
Just for a beat. Long enough to feel darkness cool behind his eyelids before his cell phone sets to buzzing.
And he receives a text image of a partially squashed tortoise.