nexus_sages | +1 gun fight

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+1 gun fight

A new door opens in the Nexus, signalled by the fact that there is a serious gun-fight on the other end. A young blonde, wearing skin-tight clothes and sporting colorful ponytails, rolls through the door. She fires some shots back into the scene that she just left as cover fire, before slamming the door closed for a brief moment to catch her breath.

It takes her a moment to realize that she doesn't hear the gun fire anymore.

And then she stands, alerted to the fact that she is somewhere new. Somewhere with millions of sights... and sounds... Her eyes get big. And wide.

She puts her gun into a holster at her hips, as she spins around to take in everything all at once. And laughs, as she spins faster and faster, until she gets a little dizzy and has to sit down.

When a random couch shows up right in front of her, it causes another laugh as the girl plops down on the cushy cushions. "I am dreaming... someone pinch me."

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Well that gets her attention. She smiles up at him.

"Sure there are. Hundreds. I just like going for the most-fun option."

She sits up slightly on the couch, folding her legs in close to her body. "See, right there... a good example of 'you are not dreaming' logic."

"What is so special about the door?"

"The most-fun option is being pinched?" the lizard asks dubiously. The question of the door is something he can more readily answer. "If a return to the world from which you came is desired, there are likely to be few if any more expedient paths. This place is large, and there are many doors--to lose yours among them might equate to losing your world."

"I can choose if I want to go back or not?" This comes as a revelation. Her options of what is waiting for her back home are not the best.

"Now you got me thinking that this is a dream..." Because things like this don't happen to her.

"While you have the door, you have the choice," he clarifies, "and there may be other ways back--or there may not. But I am given to understand that many live quite contentedly here, divorced from the worlds of their origin in one way or another."

"Is it perhaps time for another non-pinch?"

"So do I have to sit here... keeping the door in sight, while I make up my mind? Cause I ain't no good with snap decisions." She twirls one of her ponytails.

"What do you have in mind?"

"Not necessarily, but it would be wise to make yourself familiar enough with it that you could distinguish it from others, and perhaps to keep your bearings enough to find your way back," he suggests.

"You mentioned hundreds of options at your disposal; what might one of them be?"

Harley looks at her door. It looks like a standard door to her. She finally reaches into her pocket... pulling out a tube of lipstick. She stands, walks over to the door, and draws a big heart with the lipstick on the door.

"Um... usually if I am faced with a real serious situation, I know I am not dreaming. My dreams are never serious."

Her solution receives an appreciative nod. The mark is certainly distinctive. "Does this moment seem adequately serious for reality?"

"Half and half. This conversation seems pretty serious, for one of my dreams."

"But then we have couches appearing out of nowhere. And strange sights all around me." She gestures around.

"And being told that I don't have to go back... that I don't have to end up behind bars again... is pretty much the ultimate dream."

"I must admit, there are certain qualities of this place which I, too, find surreal. But if magic has taught me anything, it is that 'normal' is a highly subjective state."

Her mention of prison doesn't seem to alarm him, but does pique his curiosity. "Would it be prying to ask the reason for your incarceration?"

"Magic huh? That is the cause of this..." Harley looks around again.

"You want to know why I'm usually locked up? I caused a whole lot of trouble, including robbery, bribery, cheating, lying, and being a pest."

"I cannot be certain magic is the cause of this place, although that does stand among the leading theories. Certainly, magic seems to thrive here, in a great variety of forms." The skinny lizard sounds like a dry academic.

"Presenting a nuisance is a jail-able offense in your homeland?"

"If you are presenting a nuisance... while stealing, cheating, lying, and hurting people... than yah it is."

Harley shrugs her shoulders. "I used to hang out with a criminal mastermind. His words."

"Ah. So the act itself is not so terrible, but taken with the rest it becomes the icing on the sweetroll." The lizard nods slightly to himself, satisfied with his understanding. "A criminal mastermind? May I ask why you chose that association?"

"I sort of fell in love with him. It turned my life upside down." She plays with the tube of lipstick in her hands.

"I understand that to be its usual effect. I imagine you did not have the good fortune to be jailed together?"

"It was good fortune not to be jailed together." Harley softly tells him.

"I got caught. And then recruited to my team... we are all in the same situation. So they know how to pull at our strings."

"There was a falling out? My sympathies."

He considers her second statement, and can only ask, "they?"

"Honestly, sweetheart... it is for the best. He ain't a good influence."

"My team is sort of controlled by a government organization. They tells us what to do. What missions to take. And send us into the fray... hoping we don't come back."

"We are called the Suicide Squad because of that fact."

He dips his head in acknowledgment, accepting she knows her mind and that it would be impolite to pry.

As for her team, "that sounds... needlessly wasteful. If your own government would disregard your life so, then I begin to understand your eagerness to depart."

"We are criminals. They figure no one cares what happens to us..."

"But they are good people. Just good... bad people."

He tsks softly, shaking his head at the folly. "I am a strong believer in the chance of redemption. I, too, was once imprisoned for my faults."

"I knew that I liked you for some reason..."

"What did you do?" Harley tilts her head, interested.

"I mixed a potion for someone," he answers, then goes on to explain, "at the time of my arrest, I didn't understand what was happening. I thought perhaps I had the mischance to catch the eye of a few guards with a grudge against Argonians. Rather than beat me in an alleyway and leave me, they took me to the imperial prison and placed me in a cell indefinitely. I was not told why, and have only inferred probabilities as I learned more of surrounding circumstances."

"Sounds like maybe you were set up..." Harley shrugs lightly.

"Is that what you call yourself? An Argonian?"

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