nexus_sages | (no subject)

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"Hey, uh . . . anyone here ever had to, you know . . . reconnect with anyone before?"

The question comes from a man seated at the edge of the forum. A heavy, fringed overcoat is draped over the back of the speaker's chair, and he's kicked his pair of dusty boots up on a nearby tabletop. Overall, it looks like the man would be more at home in the American west: he wears a bolo tie and bandana around his neck, embroidered denim shirt, heavy belt buckle holding up crossed gun holsters and reinforced jeans. The tanned, scarred skin of his face contrasts starkly with his shaggy white hair. At a glance, he appears to be (at least) in his late 40's, but his eyes have a youthful, fiery spark to them.

The gunslinger swings his boots down off the table so he can sit forward and pour himself another shot from a brown-bagged bottle.

"Family in particular?" He adds before taking a swig.

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Armed, but with a stance that screams confidence with his weapon. An unfamiliar dress, but no clear signs of supernatural goings on in the man's demeanor. Consensus? Officer Suou is suspicious, but by no means jumping to any conclusions about the Nexus' newest inhabitant.

It's a step up form how he used to be. Really it's the gunslinger's question that draw's Katsuya away from the small bookstore he'd been perusing. An empty apartment and the sounds of a motorcycle bellowing to life still fresh in his mind, after all this time.

"It's never easy." Katsuya's reply is polite, but blunt. "With a parent there are expectations to impress, a sibling, expectations to protect."

Jesse's blue eyes flick up and down, taking stock of the sharp-dressed man, careful to note any sidearms. He looks nonplussed by the confident posture.

"Yeah. You come wandering back and they've made up some strange, wrong version of you in their head. Good or bad. Then you have to go about disappointing them ... or trying to plead your case." He snorts and swirls his drink around in the glass. He does this for a few beats before he returns his focus back to the officer.

"Parents and siblings? Did you have to patch things up with both?"

Jesse is loving this guy's look. He moseys over, looking every bit as western as the other man. Long scuffed duster, red bandanna around the neck, and of course, his big 'ol cowboy hat. The last one gets a polite tipping before speaking up.

"I'm kinda thankful that's not the case. I've seen bad reunions back where I'm from and it ain't never pretty. What with most of the states and a good portion o' Canada too gone to the zed."

He points at the chair opposite of the other man.

"Mind if I cop a squat?"

Jesse gives his kindred spirit a nod, trying not to let his gaze linger too long on the green skin. The guy's clearly a mutant, and it's not polite to stare! He waves a hand at the empty chair across from him. "Be my guest."

He gives the bottle of mystery booze an inviting shake and sets it back on the table within reach of the other Jesse. "What do you mean, 'zed'?"

"We call 'em zed cuz the term 'zombie' still gets some folk worked up. Don't like bein' reminded we're under attack by some critters straight from a Romero flick. Also, faster to holler 'zed' when you're too busy with yer guns."

Jesse takes a seat, pulling out his duster from under him before doing so and pushing it to one side. He's also glad to join him in the drinking! Even the undead can still appreciate something wet and intoxicating. Thankfully, there's another shot glass on hand, so he helps himself and slugs it back before talking again.

"Hopefully, y'all ain't got anything like that back where you hail from, stranger."

He takes a moment to process the odd terminology, and thinks he gets the gist. He definitely doesn't know how this convergence of realities works, but he's seen enough odd things to just kinda roll with it.

Jesse sighs and traces a scratched name on the table. Some previous patron marking their seat. "Just so happens that we do. Some people call 'em wels. Some people call 'em reapers. Regardless of the name, they're sad husks. Used to be normal folks. All you can do is put 'em out of their misery."

He raises a fresh shot glass. "Amen to that," and then belts it back. "Time to send 'em back and let the maker sort 'em out. Put 'em to rest." Funny that a zombie would say something like that, but then again, he's pretty aware for a zombie and his talk already seems to separate himself from these 'zed'.

"So what's this about reunions, pardner? You havin' to reconnect with an ex-missus? That's always a rough damn time."

Jesse grunts his grim agreement with that sentiment and knocks back his own shot. Rest in peace, zombies and zombie analogs.

"Nah, nothing like that. It's my kids. I was out of the picture for a while. My daughter's adjusting fine, mostly, but she's only ..." - there's an awkward pause while he taps fingers on the tabletop and does the mental math - ". . . only seven. The boy's a different matter. Sixteen! What a goddamn age to deal with."

He cracks a wry half-smile. "I wasn't really the best dad material to begin with."

"Huh. Well, ain't gonna fault you for tryin'," says the other Jesse while pouring himself another shot. The guy can drink and he appears to do so aggressively. Maybe since he's dead, it takes a lot for it to sink in. "Where'd you go that you weren't around your kids for so long, though? If y'don't mind me askin', of course. It's a rough ol' thing, but if you got zed-likes runnin' around, sometimes people get split up. That's life."

Katsuya shakes his head slowly, his gaze shifting down and to the side as he considers how to respond. Whatever happened, he's not exactly eager to think about.

"No. I never got the chance to reconnect with my father. But I've seen it before, on the job. I have...a younger brother though." It's still have, right? No past tenses Katsuya, he's gone--not dead.

"Who are you trying to find?"

"Family can be tricky," notes a child in green and black. Is he wearing a crown? "It's especially hard if there's a lasting impression you've got to work against. What happened?"

"Ah yeah, sorry about your dad." He presses his lips together in a sympathetic frown. "At least you've got your brother? I never had any siblings, but I can see where they've gotta be great to have around, even if they can be a pain in the ass. They know your story."

Jesse runs a hand through his hair, fluffing it up even more. "Me? I'm approaching it from the other side. Trying to fit back in with my own kids. Life being crazy as it is, I don't want any regrets. Not for me or for them, you know?"

"It's a long story, buddy, and I'm not sure there's enough booze for the telling. Let's just say the reapers -- the 'zed' things -- were only part of the problem. Add in tons of political garbage, social unrest, war..." He waves an arm in ever-increasing arcs.

"We were refugees, you could say. I tried keeping my family hidden away from it all, but hiding in a hole isn't my style. I'm not gonna sit around and wait for trouble to show up at my doorstep. So I was out fighting the good fight for a while."

Jesse gives the kid a sideways glance, taking in the odd clothes. He figures he'll never tire of people-watching in this Nexus place. "Yeah, it takes a hell of a lot of time to undo that damage."

His chair creaks in protest as he leans back. Metal clinks against metal with the shift in his movement. "I was away from my family for five? Six years? Not much time at all when you're grown, but for kids, that's an eternity . . .

"It's hard to earn back someone's trust when you've left 'em in the lurch. Especially when they've been told again and again that you're bad news."

"Y'sure y'all ain't from my neck of the woods?" He says it with a laugh as he picks up his freshly-pour shot glass, swirling the content in consideration for a time. "Sounds awful familiar, what with zed, political types, society gone to hell, gang wars, so on."

Then Jesse take the shot, smacking his withered lips appreciatively once it's swallowed. "I know they're just kids, but they can't blame ya for that, can they? Their daddy goin' out to fight for their safety, I mean. Hard to explain why y'all can't sit tight with 'em, but someone's gotta take the fight to the reapers and the zed, right?"

"My brother would say that we have to do the right thing, no matter what it costs us. Even when they locked him in a dungeon, he said that. Even knowing it would cost his life. Maybe your kids have heard bad things about you, but do the right thing, and they'll see it," he offers. Which is, admittedly, un-Loki-like advice, but Loki the God of Mischief is trying to forge a different life for himself than Loki the God of Evil.

"I can say it's not easy, but you can change in people's eyes. They still don't trust me completely, but they don't hate me anymore. Well, not all of them."

Jesse mirrors the laugh. "Nice to know mine's not the only uh, world? -- is that what we're calling 'em? -- that's been weathering a shitstorm.

"I think the kids are beginning to understand. Gotta admit though . . . sometimes it's a little hard to feel like I was justified in leaving. At least after hearing how they struggled. After their mom died, they were fending for themselves." He scratches the back of his head and a frown creases his face.

"Sorry, buddy. The drink's making me chatty. Got a lot on my mind lately." He sighs and looks across the forum. "I'm more than a little baffled by this place, but I gotta say, it's nice to have a place to take a breather."

"The place is plenty odd, but the company's swell." He tips his hat to the other man. "And don't fret, talkin's what this place is about, it seems. Askin' questions, gettin' answers."

He drums his fingers on the table for a moment. "Well...The kids might be a little right about bein' bent outta shape. Was their ma still among the livin' when you left?" Or did he leave literal babes in the woods to fend for themselves? Because yeah, sorry other Jesse, that's a pretty bad call as far as parenting goes.

"Hah, yeah. I'm trying to spend more time on the high road these days." He slides his empty glass back and forth between his hands.

"Your brother sounds an awful lot like my son -- always gotta do the right thing. It's good and honorable, but yeah, sometimes it costs you. Or worse yet, someone pulls the wool over your eyes and the right you thought you were doing was wrong the whole time. It's a tricky business."

He gives Loki an appreciative look. "You got some deep thoughts for just a kid, you know?"

Loki nods sympathetically. "Tricks are somewhat more my business than my brother's--but I've found that if you're really good at it, you can pull the wool over someone bad's eyes, and get them doing good when they think they're serving their own ends."

At the praise, Loki gives an offhanded shrug. "It's kind of a necessity. Everyone is big and strong, where I come from, and I'm... plainly not. So I've got to do something else."

For a moment it's as though the floor has opened up under Katsuya. His stomach plummets. He doesn't want to think about Tatsuya. Not here, not now. It's easier to focus on the newcomer's situation.

"How old are your children?" The officer adjusts his tinted glasses in an attempt to hide his expression until he gets himself back under control. "Ah, apologies. I'm Katsuya Suou. If I'm going to pry into your business...I thought I ought to at least introduce myself."

The military man in the blue uniform looks as though he's trying to find the right opening to answer the posed question for several minutes before approaching. Despite the slow approach, he carries an air of easy confidence as he walks up to the man at the edge of the Forum.

"Seems like most of us have family to get back to, though I reckon the situation isn't the same for all of us as it is for others." Hughes is trying to, subtly, point out that if a man is drinking that heavily while asking questions about reconnecting with family, he's obviously not in a good place. He tries not to give off an air of pity as he says it, but it's obvious to anyone who didn't miss the subtext in his statement.

Jesse is, as of late, sensitive to any acknowledgement of his drinking habit. He rests an elbow on the table and props his chin on his hand, downplaying the now-mostly-empty bottle and glass. (Part of the credit for that goes to zombie-Jesse at this point.)

"What's your story, friend?" The military uniform is easy to pick out regardless of most origins. "Were you deployed somewhere away from yours?"

Jesse picks up on the fact that the other man might be having a moment, and takes the hint to drop the sore subject.

"Jesiah Black," he says, offering a calloused hand for a shake. "A pleasure."

"My brats are seven and sixteen. The older one's pretty much a man grown, weird as it is to say. Even the younger one -- my daughter -- seems old beyond her years. They've both been through a lot. Way more than I had to deal with by their age."

Katsuya takes it. He has similar callouses to Mr. Black's on his hands--years of shooting and cleaning his firearm.

Ah, there was no getting around it, was there? They couldn't talk about family without...
"My brother and I have a similar age difference. I don't know their situation, Mr. Black, but believe me when I say that children are stronger than they look."

Katsuya gives a sort of nostalgic smile. "Even if we wished they wouldn't have to be." If his kids have seen half the things Katsuya knows his brother's seen, he can understand the concern Mr. Black must feel. Those so young shouldn't have to shoulder such a burden.

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