The Third Guest

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diogenes_icon.gif raquelle_icon.gif

Scene Title The Third Guest
Synopsis The Cambria household is graced by the arrival of yet another unwelcome guest, and his intentions are shrouded in darkness, just like his true identity.
Date September 3, 2009

Brooklyn - The Cambria Household


The Cambria household. Usually home to just one man and two of his daughters, tonight it also housed pure and unadulterated chaos, and silence that embraced the house was nothing but deceptive.

A slimly built young man stood before the front door of the house, carelessly left unlocked by former guests. He stands silent and unmoving, staring at the entrance of the house. It is late. Very much so - it's nearly three in the night, and it's not too long until the sun will peek out from behind the horizon. No doubt whoever inhabits the house is asleep. Or are they? Diogenes steps from left to right, from right to left, half-encircling the door as if a predator unsure whether the prey is ready to be pounced on. He bites down on his lower lip and harmlessly chews on it in thought.

And then he walks around the house. One could think that he is inspecting, observing, exploring… But he is merely thinking. Thinking whether he should simply leave and look for a place to call it a day and return another time. And for a brief moment, that alternative seemed to be the one Diogenes would choose, but then dull, pale light flickering behind a window catches his attention. TV?

Fast forward a couple of minutes, and Diogenes is inside. Intuition demanded that he would try to open the door before knocking on it. Why would someone leave the door open? It hardly mattered. No, the young adult was now wondering who is inside. Carefully yet boldly he steps forth, looking around curiously. No one, so far. Perhaps it's for the best, for he's so ignorantly walking about that if it were a minefield, he'd be long gone in a grotesque cloud of guts.

"Pretty picture", he murmurs to himself, now in the living room, holding a single framed picture of Raquelle and his girls together. Soon enough, it's placed back where it was found, and he continues his trek. Raquelle's unconscious body is ignored as though he actually doesn't notice it. But he does. It becomes apparent when he carefully steps over the body to walk over to the kitchen.

The fridge's light turns itself on as the door swings open. Glass hits glass as Diogenes tries to look for anything to drink. "You could start a bar, my friend", he mutters under his breath. Ultimately, he picks vodka. He takes a swig. Not bad.

The stranger's odyssey ends up with him sitting on a chair, reclining rather comfortably in it whilst staring at the limp body of the cosmetologist. "Having a bad day?", he asks the unconscious man. "Yeah, I'm not having the best week, either. To us", he announces, lifting up the bottle and taking another unhealthy swig.

Diogenes rises from his chair and walks up to Raquelle. "I always wanted to do this", he says, tipping the bottle and letting its contents pour on Kelly's face.

Poisoned…check. Tranquilized…check. Raquelle in his shirtless state, tatoos and piercings exposed, would probably prefer to have on a shirt by now with everybody and their psychopathic ninja mother seem to be coming and going from his home this day/night/last 16+ hours or so. He's rolled over mostly on his side, out like a light but the chemicals in his system and the dart in his chest seem to be wearing off.

But too slow…

He doesn't get the chance to wake up on his own as he hears faintly and barely the sound of somebody moving around his house. He's not quite awake yet before…

"You sunth of a bith, whath th'FUCK!" Raquelle is now awake when that liquid hits his face and he lashes out rather violently with a fist, it is a reflex as he gasps and flails with his other arm, giving a sneeze like snort and making a 'lkajweh;lkajwrhawhrw' sorta noise.

The upturned bottle would be reverted to its former upright position before it's emptied of all of its delicious content, even if Raquelle hadn't woken up from the trickle of spirits splashing unto his visage. Diogenes did not want to waste such precious spirits on such a mundane task, after all. Fortunately, however, the amount he spills is enough to warrant the house owner's awakening. A chuckle is held back, but a smirk is not. The third intruder this house sees tonight is thoroughly amused by Kelly battling air; Diogenes stood behind Raquelle, suspecting a rude awakening.

Vodka is decidedly shared with Raquelle, although not before Diogenes gives the bottle one final kiss. Only then it would be harshly placed on the floor not too far from the poor man with a fairly loud thud. "Have some vodka. Be my guest", he speaks the ironic words nonchalantly, "Something tells me you really need a few swigs of that." As he speaks, he wanders over to the mute salesman trying to prostitute some worthless novelty item to an audience that does not exist, and turns the TV off.

Darkness.

Darkness swallows the living room, consuming the stranger along with it. A raspy, disembodied voice rings in the air. "I came here with one question, but now I have two. Let's start with the one you'll answer more easily." A long pause almost implies the disappearance of the man. Much to Raquelle's dismay, though, he's still there. "What happened here?"

Lashes flutter, hand moves to wipe over his face after a few moments and he shifts a tad weakly. He's sore, he's achy, and exhausted and not in one of those 'had a hell of a good weekend' kinda ways. Raquelle's baby blues, however glossy, roll around a bit before his fist just lowers and his hand opens to rest on his chest with a groan.

Lips smack and he is thirsty, hand reaching out and straining a bit to edge the bottle closer to himself, fingers bending and nails gently scratching against the bottle as he drags his closer and then pauses. He stares at the young man's sorta blurry face. He raises the bottle up to squint at it. "Wh-who are you and wh-"

Then the TV is turned off so it is dark. He can't see jack, or jill, or the stranger who put his germs on his bottle of vodka. His special bottle of vodka. He lets the bottle drop and fall over onto the carpet, liquid spilling and soaking in. It's dark so he can't see the traces of powder, but he knows and he can faintly feel they are still there.

But he does notice one thing…something that makes him forget that and invisible man is asking him questions. "Where-where are they?" He props himself up on an elbow, working on sitting up and taking deep breaths. "Where, BJ? BILLY JEAN?! DIANA?" He sits up and looks around. "My girls…shit bitches took my girls…" He's now working his way up to his knees, very focused as he gropes for his dropped skillet. And he probably won't find it, but he's looking.

Diogenes is shrouded in both darkness and silence as Raquelle slowly but surely works his way up to a kneeling position, his questions evolving from a query regarding the intruder's identity to a flurry of rabidly exclaimed questions concerning the absence of someone dear to him. Diogenes looks over in the general direction of the picture he's picked up earlier. No, he cannot see in the dark, just like Raquelle, but he does more or less remember the layout of the house.

Diana? Billy Jean? That's two. A feminine name and an extraordinarily silly name that only a kid could get away with without being utterly humiliated with. Considering that there's no wife in the picture he's examined, and no traces of her in others he's glanced at, no doubt both of the individuals the man refers to are his daughters. Or, more simply, he's referred to them as 'his girl's. Whatever happened here, Raquelle was left alone and in a fairly indignant position, robbed of his life's greatest treasures.

Did it phase Diogenes? Hardly. Did that serve as an obstacle? Hardly. If anything, he is only mildly annoyed by the way Kelly awakens, but how else would a man under given circumstances wake up? "My name is Diogenes", he introduces himself as Mister Cambria desperately searches for a weapon that's not there, "and I am looking for an honest man. If you are one, we will have a very pleasant conversation. If not… well, we won't."

"I take it you're more concerned with your… 'girls'… So, let's play a game. A game of quid pro quo. I'll start. Who took them?"

Raquelle has somehow gotten to his feet. It takes work but he's there, arms held out to steady himself before he just frowns and squints in the direction of Dio's voice and he sighs softly, hands going to his hips and he sways slightly but just nods slowly. "Are you here to poison or shoot me or be a psychopathic bitch?"

He just closes his eyes and nods slowly. "Snow White and her fucking Ninja Dwarf, I don't know their names…I just know…they were here, and now they aren't." He's lost, he's tired, he's scared, he's stumbling towards the coffee table, slamming his shin against it and swearing in Japanese but able to lean over and grope around for his cell phone.

Whatever his true identity is, the stranger is a young man. His voice is mature and raspy, but it unmistakeably possesses youthful undertones that are not overly difficult to notice. He is tall and slim, something Raquelle can possibly notice over time once his eyes accustom to the darkness and he is able to make out his guest's contours. Wait, slim? No, he looks downright gaunt. Whether it is an illusion - Kelly's mind playing tricks on him - is hard to tell, but thanks to his inexplicable presence and unusual appearance, the stranger is most certainly eerie.

Lips smack noisily in the morbidly dark living room. "I am not here to poison you. I am not here to shoot you. But I will be a psychopathic bitch if you decide not to play along with my games. And my games are usually beneficial for both parties." Dull, relatively silent steps indicate that Diogenes is on the move. He leans wholly against the wall, watching Raquelle. It's not that hard to guess what he's looking for, as most people in his position would try to look for one of two things - a cell phone or to check whether their prized possessions are lost. Since the latter is already cleared up… "If you're looking for a cell phone to call nine-one-one, I'll be gone and some cops will arrive to investigate. You'll go to the precinct first thing in the morning, fill out a pile of paperwork in an hour or two, and wait for a week until police officers give up. Give it a year, and you'll see your girls on a newspaper."

He makes sure to add after a brief pause: "In the obituaries." He snorts. "Or you can play my game."

Raquelle's hand just wraps around the cellphone and he isn't dialing anything. He really hadn't thought about 911 initially, he just holds the phone tightly once his hand closes around it and he just leans against the coffee table, dropping back to his knees and swallowing hard. "You know, wanting people to play with you isn't psychopathic bitch, it is needy bitch who keeps going to the club but just can't get a date because Helga the drag queen told everybody you had crabs." He grits out, he's starting to be able to talk more easily. Even if there is that faint slur there for those who listen.

He takes another deep breath and rests his forehead against the coffee table. "I just want my girls. Play, talk, do the can can, I don't give a fuck…I just want my girls. So whatever you feel you have to do."

"Can-can? There's an idea."

A chuckle can be heard from the direction of the 'needy bitch'. How fortunate that Raquelle actually manages to summon his sense of humour at a time as dire as this one, as opposed to screaming and running back and forth as he'd expect from victims of a kidnapper. Speaking of which…

"Tell me what the kidnappers were like. Were either of them, or were both of them Evolved? If so, can you describe their ability?"

Diogenes looks at the figure sprawled on the coffee table, gripping tightly what most likely is a cell phone. It was peculiar to see him speak and move with difficulty, which hinted at impaired locomotive capabilities. The poor guy must have been hit in the head pretty hard. Yes, Diogenes failed to notice the tranq' gun dart, and he didn't know Kelly meant Maeve by Snow White.

"Do you go by the name Sal in any circle?" Where'd that come from?
"…." Raquelle really is trying to talk until the nightmare/weirdness goes away so he replies after a few moments. "One was a ninja. With a gun. The other…who came first, liked to blow cocaine around all over the place and bitch knocked me out a few times. I'm not a scientist, I'm a hair stylist, how the hell do I know if somebody is evolved?"

Wrinkle of his nose as he grips his phone, then he has to laugh, hoarsely. "Sal? Sal? Why would I go by the name /Sal/? Just Raq or Kelly man…do you need anything else? Really? Or are you going to continue to ask questions? If not, would you mind getting the hell out of my house now so I can wallow in my loss and trauma alone? Possibly naked and wasted on Rum?"

Silence greets Raquelle's words. No chuckle or even a snort is heard this time. Diogenes is often keen to enter a valiant battle of wits, but not this time. This time, he was trying to strike a deal, however subtly, and he did not appreciate that the hair stylist was so shy of details. "Is the woman… who 'blew cocaine all over the place'… Was she all white, like an albino? Slimly built, and her powder paralysed you?" He wasted no time, and as he waited for Raquelle to respond, he dug deep into the reaches of his cerebrum. And as he discovered, indeed there were remaining shards of obstacles getting in the way of transmitted signals.

Give it a couple of seconds, and Raquelle would feel as if he were a puppet on strings being lifted from the ground; like a weary old man throwing a sack of potatoes off his back. Relative clarity would return to Kelly, granting him full control of his body without leftovers of the tranquiliser and Maeve's powder to restrict his attempts to speak or move. Apparently, Diogenes is only able to grant Raquelle full movement, but headaches and the like? Sorry, buddy.

"Very white, like an albino, and yes pow-wait, how do you-" All the caution that starts to creep into his thick tones is cut short as he's hit with another foreign feeling, eyes sliding shut as he stretches out after the clarity returns and he can move his jaw and his body more easily? He laughs softly, low and rumbling laugh edged with a hint of insanity? You know the laugh, he just flops back onto his back, clutching that phone and laughing, shaking his head. "Th-thank you…" Then more laughter. He's had…uh, a rough night.

"This night has just gotten a lot more interesting."

Again, the young stranger's steps whispered of slow movement in the direction of the coffee table. He was but a gaunt young man, and yet those steps were somehow heavy, his nearing presence darkly ominous, even though Raquelle was most likely not in the (mental) position to be intimidated right now. The things darkness, obscurement and the unknown would do if he were…

"Her nickname is the Sandman. She's the only one who beats me in the 'crap aliases' department", he remarks, reaching out to grab the picture he's examined a short while ago. "Unfortunately for her, I beat her in the 'paralysing ability' department. Shamefully." Crack! Glass shards fly towards the ground, and a single wooden piece of the frame tumbles down, as well. The picture is retrieved and duly stuffed into Dio's pocket. "How long ago has this happened? Have you overheard where she's going? And why the hell did she leave you?" He turns to face him. "She does not leave families. She murders them." Whether accidentally or not was unclear to Diogenes. A lot of things related to Maeve were unclear, but he did not want to shower Raquelle in redundant details.

"Interesting is p-putting it lightly." Raquelle manages as his laughter dies down and he just squeezes his eyes shut. He's listening though, and mostly not watching/looking in Diogenes's direction. His eyes do snap open however when he hears something break. "Sandman, paralysing, little scary people..okay, got it, fucked up my life, but got it. - What the hell did you just break?!"

He clears his throat and shakes his head slowly. "When the ninja arrived, I managed to brain her with a skillet and do a bit of damage…don't know where she's going, Diana the youngest had been hiding safely in the bathroom but came out when she thought it was safe in time for me to get shot while trying to wake BJ up…I don't know /shit/ okay? I just…"

His eyes slide shut once more. "I just gotta get my girls back…" He's trying not to think about the murdering thing. Trying hard.

"The frame of the picture that has you, BJ and Diana in it. How else do you expect me to recognise her?"

People are much more prone to help you if you give them something in return. And as it happens, the goal of finding Raquelle's daughters coincides with his goal of finding Maeve. Whether he will actually bring the girls back is a different matter. He is not your typical hero. Hell, any vocabulary wouldn't call him one. He wouldn't claim to be one, either. On the other hand, he finds it completely acceptable and even admirable to show others (in controlled amounts) that life can suck, thus preparing them for when life really will suck.

In Raquelle's case, that would be returning with only one daughter, or not returning at all. To return as a triumphant hero would be to let Kelly know that miracles exist, that generous do-gooders drop down from the sky and fix everything for you. But the chances of that are one in a million, whereas having your life turned upside down is one in a hundred. It is hypocritical of Diogenes to hold onto this dogma that many will find flawed, but he is full aware of his hypocrisy.

"Wait twenty four hours. If I don't return, feel free to call the police." More steps. Click! goes the light switch, and the temporarily blinding light illuminates the living room. "And those piercings on your nipples are hilarious", he remarks in an upbeat tone, nowhere to be seen. The sound of a door swinging open and subsequently closing can be heard. The mysterious stranger took his leave.

…He broke his picture. Drank his vodka. Raquelle's gathering a list why not to like this strange skinny man in his house. But he has more of a reason to hate other people right now so he just gives a tiny little 'oh of course' manly giggle sound, taking another deep breath.

24 hours…a murderess, a ninja, a stranger who needs to eat. Raquelle just nods slowly, wearily. He opens his mouth to reply before shutting it and nning softly. "LOCK THE DAMN DOOR AFTER YOU!" Door shuts, he murmurs softly. "…well shit." And slams his head back against the floor, gripping that cellphone. Rough night indeed.


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