capeandcowllogs | Now that you've been broken down, Got your head out of the clouds

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Now that you've been broken down, Got your head out of the clouds

WHO: Hal ~~Tighten~~ and Roxanne
WHERE: A little coffee shop by her workplace
WHEN: Thursday morning
WARNINGS: Hal's a creeper and doesn't take "no" well.
SUMMARY: Hal meets Roxanne for a coffee date. Roxanne meets Hal to say "back off." This should go well.
FORMAT: Whatever works

The last few weeks have been disappointing. Hal was lost and confused after arriving in the City. People critiqued his outfit, mocked his perception on what was going on as naive, and dared him to risk fighting the entity responsible for their abduction. They talked a lot about there being many people with super powers, and that was downright unnerving. If they were telling the truth, the local heroes had to be pretty good at what they did! After all, the City looks like a city, and not a crater.

They weren't good enough, if Roxanne got kidnapped again! But that was nothing new, she was just a magnet for the villainous sort. Hal hadn't been in any position to intervene, since it happened before he arrived. So when they talked, for a very few minutes, she told him he'd been kidnapped. She didn't explain anything else, promised to talk to him later... and then she went completely incognito for a couple weeks.

He didn't want to risk fighting any of the heroes, and if they were so good at what they did, who cared! No one was going to notice. His designated foe Megamind wasn't around to thrash, and Roxanne wasn't around to watch. So he looked intently for messages from her for a few days, lounging around his place in the MAC. And when nothing came, he found other ways to pass the time and amuse himself.

Until today, that is, when suddenly Roxanne contacted him and invited him out to coffee. An invitation to coffee, Hal knew, was a way of having a sorta-date without actually saying it was a date. That comfortable in-between thing, when people aren't ready to put a label on their feelings just yet.

Superpowers meant he would comfortably arrive long before she would. He saw no need to dress up when they were still playing it casually, but flowers would be a good gesture. What did they mean, after all? Did they mean 'This is a date and this is a romantic gesture,' or just something friendly and platonic like 'I hope you enjoyed your vacation?' It was open to interpretation; whatever she needed to interpret it as for the ~~talk~~ date to go well.

Hal sits at a table, decorated with various flowers in a hastily acquired vase, tapping at a handheld system.

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She sees him from the window and almost turns right around and heads to work. This was a terrible idea, and she should feel bad for having it. Seriously. But she's here, she's committed, and she's feeling dumber just for being within a block's radius of the ginger-headed wannabe boyfriend turned creeper.

Now, messaging Spider-Man to be in the area in case something went wrong seemed like a terribly sensible thing, and she was glad she had the forethought to so do.

She takes a breath, steels herself. Her watch is on and activated -- the idea of picking up his emotions is repugnant; she needs her head to belong to just her for this. She opens the door, and steps inside, heels clicking on the tiled floor as she approaches.

"Hal. You ... shouldn't have." She -- touches the flowers, smile tight, and then gently sets them aside.

One of the little cafe's waitresses comes by, and she gets a very simple, if sweet, mocha, and lets Hal order before she moves on. "We-- need to catch up a bit, don't we?"

Seriously, she needed a better game plan for this.

It turns out that enhanced senses don't actually distinguish between people when you're not actively looking for them. As part of Hal didn't believe she would actually show, he'd gotten more into the game than keeping an eye out.

Seeing her come in, he jolts upright and beams a brighter smile than is strictly appropriate. He just manages not to fall off the seat; he's still not entirely used to the changes in his body, especially when excited.

"Oh, that? That was nothing, it didn't cost anythi--I mean, it was just a little quick thing." Hal does, at least, pick up the lack of appreciative sniff. If a girl doesn't make a point of sniffing them and smiling, she's not excited by the gift.

An empty cup sits to the side with his discarded handheld, so he orders a replacement; a large espresso drink, with plenty of sugar in it.

"Ha, yeah, we barely talked, and then it was like you vanished off the face of the planet, after I first got here. So like, what's up? How long have you even been here?" The excitement over talking and having coffee is enough to override the bitterness. Mostly.

She takes a seat, inwardly marking all exits in her mind -- and then kicking himself. Not going to matter if this goes someplace ugly. That's why she called for back up.

"Three months, Hal. Long enough to get established in a new job, make a few friends, that sort of thing," she replies; thankfully, the coffees don't take long to prep -- especially since she didn't ask for anything particularly fancy, and neither did he.

She takes a sip of her coffee-- like she needs more caffeine after her first cup this morning-- and then says, "From the look of you, I'm guessing... it was about June when you left Metro City? Middle of summer, everything nice. It's -- September, when I last left."

Hopefully he can understand what she means there: that she's a good three months in his future. She's not making the same offer to him that Megamind got. Unlike Megamind, Hal needs to be TOLD not to be that guy-- to be told that he has no chance, and not in shock and fear and upset.

Edited 2011-12-30 19:07 (UTC)

Extra caffeine is likely to make their conversation even more excited; this is another thing they probably didn't need.

He puzzles out her remarks for a moment. "So, like, you got taken from home later than me, but you got here before me? That's messed up."

A few people alluded to the paradoxes of time passing unaffected by their abductions, but Hal really did not follow what they were saying. He can only conclude that Roxanne was left without him for several months at home, and then another few months here. She would have gone all this time, alone in a strange place, without even knowing about his secret identity. It was no wonder she hadn't tried to get in touch with him sooner! It would have been weird for her to try, since it would only remind her of her loneliness. Good thing he was here now.

"That sucks...! That you were here, all alone, I mean. And still getting kidnapped! It's too bad there wasn't some, like, amazing superhero to stop all of that, huh?"

"Like Titan, Hal?"

She lets those three words sink in, before she moves on.

"I know about Titan, Hal. I know about Titan, and about Space Dad and all that. I know why you did it, and I know -- I know everything, Hal. Which is why I wanted to talk to you," she said in that serious, important and heartfelt tone that indicated that in no way shape or form had she fallen into Titan's arms and swooned at any point of those three months that she had lived on and he had not.

She knew this getting into dangerous waters. Her coffee arrived and she didn't touch it.

Those words sink into the metaphorical water of Hal's mind. At first he jolts, gaping in surprise at her remark. The ripples spread through him as he first realizing that, no, how could she possibly know any of that?

"You know about Tighten..? But, but that was all a secret, I didn't even show you anything yet."

Way to spoil the surprise, Roxanne. Jeez. Can't a guy have a present in his closet without a girl stumbling in on it and ruining the fun?

Hal genuinely doesn't realize that, back home, time passes as though he was never abducted to the City. The idea that she refuses him is nowhere in his head; the closest to a theory he has is that maybe random people were calling in sightings of the flying figure in the City, and she investigated in his absence. Her solemn tone is lost on him so far.

"I'm guessing you're still in training. You haven't-- revealed yourself to me yet, as far as you remember," she replies, watching him carefully. "But at home you did. I was working on Megamind's plan. He was creating a hero to challenge him, so things could go back to the way he liked it-- hero fights villain, villain to jail-- the eternal struggle."

She-- is really sick of that eternal struggle, from the way her voice get sharp. But that's not the time and place for it, is it?

Coming back from the edge of anger-- doesnt' do her any good to get angry nw--she takes up her drink, finally sips at it, before she sets it down.

"Do you understand? I know everything that happens. Everything you want to tell me, you already have. Everything you wanted to do, you've done. Which is why I'm bringing you a warning from a future, Hal, because I know -- you could be a good guy," she says. "But being a good guy is work. Hard work. And the good guy doesn't always get the girl, either."

Hal shakes his head, hoping it would dispel the sudden, confusing turn of the conversation. Roxanne knows because he told her? Even though he was abducted before he did? That means that either she's lying, or there was some weirder explanation. And she sounded too serious to be lying.

"Oh, man, this is like, time travel crap, or alternate universes or whatever, right? It didn't happen for me, but it happened for you, so you're acting like it was all totally real? Okay, fine, I'll listen."

Her enigmatic remarks about the eternal struggle and her helping with Megamind's plan for some reason, Hal disregards. The important thing here is that Roxanne knows, and is solemn and sitting on the opposite side of the table, without anything like the friendliness she should be showing to the guy she cares about.

So something goes wrong in the future. Something that leaves her the most unhappy with him that he's ever seen.

"A warning, huh? What did this future-me do, anyway, that you've got to warn me?" Hal asks, challenging her to convince him. He doesn't hide his indignant annoyance, still not quite convinced that they're having this chat over their coffees.

"Because I believe you still have the chance to be a good person, Hal, and I don't want to see that chance lost," she replied-- and it was with heartfelt belief. She wants to see him not be that guy. Not simply because that guy was very scary and she felt more powerless before him then she'd ever felt, that she'd used every trick that had that didn't compromise herself to try and get that guy on board, to save her life--

"You don't get what you want. Heroics is hard. Not a lot of reward. And with your primary motivation on someone else's arm you do something very foolish. You hurt and scare people, Hal. You become the bad guy. I don't want to see that happen to you here, Hal."

But there's that unspoken thread there, through this whole conversation, that he's sure to grasp -- even if he doesn't get anything else that's being said to him: I'm with someone else and it isn't you, and I'm not willing to sacrifice that to keep you good.

At the word 'still,' Hal's eyes narrow. He listens with increasingly visible skepticism until she finishes, and shrugs dramatically.

"What, like I'm not a good guy, right now? That computer thing grabbed me to be a hero. That's what good guys are, right?"

Without waiting for a response, Hal readies himself to continue complaining. The sheer ridiculousness of the idea that being a hero is purely work, especially when Space Dad isn't around to critique him, is ridiculous. Metroman was messing up plenty, to go by how many times Roxanne got kidnapped, and he got a museum and conferences and all kinds of women swooning over him. And Roxanne thinks there's no rewards in it?

And then he notices the unspoken thread, the one she hints at with on someone else's arm.

On someone else's arm?

His voice shakes a little as he asks, "Whoa. Wait. What are you saying?"

"You have an opportunity here, Hal, to retake your life and be a good person for the right reasons," Roxanne says firmly, her blue eyes going hard. "But the right reason isn't 'getting the girl'. Because there's nobody to get. There is no 'us'. There was no us, and there will never be an 'us'. There is me and someone else. And even if there wasn't... I just don't feel hat way about you, Hal."

She doesn't say she's sorry. She's not sorry for failing to fall into his fantasy. She's not sorry for not returning his affection. She's not sorry for any of it.

Hal laughs weakly, more frustrated than amused. "Of course there wasn't an us. You were always, ~Metro Man~ this, and Metro Man that. You don't give a crap about anyone else. And what's with that?! I mean, what did Metro Man have that I don't?"

In the fine line of disgusting creepers everywhere, Hal tries to be a Nice Guy and shrug off the lack of apology. He's sure she hasn't properly thought through what a terrible person she is for rejecting him. All he needs to do is get her to understand it.

"Metro Man is--was a good friend," she corrects, as much for the betrayal as for his 'death'. "And our friendship was complicated by the supeheroics-- but he still--"

Never let her down.

Until he did.

"He was still twice the man you will ever be, if you want to be frank," she says, getting sharp. "He was there for me when I needed him, and I did the same for him. You have no right to bring him up to me, ever."

She gave him a chance-- but while she might let Megamind make her feel a little guilty about his richly deserved dumping, Hal has no such power over her. If she has to break out the cluebat, she will... she just ha to hope that she won't regret it.

"As if I never tried to be there for you. Sure, okay." He rolls his eyes, remembering times where he followed her to abandoned buildings, and never called for help. He was there for her, and that was apparently what counted. Her own fault for not reciprocating.

"And, you are being stupidously unfair. You keep talking like I'm the bad guy who hurt you, but I didn't do anything to you!" His voice raises and his eyes light up. It's unintentional, though, so it probably doesn't count as harm. Hal pauses anyway, takes a deep breath, and quieted again.

"You should remember that before blaming me for whatever you think you've been through."

He sits back, crossing his arms, awaiting his clearly deserved apology.

"Being there for someone because you care and being there because you're waiting for them to acknowledge they're madly in love with you is two separate things, Hal," Roxanne's voice is a razor, slicing through the argument he presents. "If you hadn't wanted something -- you would have been gone sniffing around some one else's skirts, pronto, and you know it."

Because she saw him do it. Oh, he never found the new girl, but all the same, as soon as he was rejected -- he turned on her like a viper. But she goes-- very still, when she sees the familiar flare of laser vision. Everything stops for a few seconds, her hands flat on the table, body tensed and ready to bolt. He's angry. Too angry. But there's no backing down. She can't. Or he'll press and press and press and it will only get worse.

She can't be afraid of him. Or he will have her -- if not possess her, he'll have her running, and Roxanne is tired of running from superpowered assholes.

"I know what I've been through. And I know who was there for me when it was happening, and when it was over. And it wasn't you. Just like you tried to get me alone when Metro Man wasn't even cold in his--" imaginary-- "grave. Wedding photographer, Hal?"

She can't even begin to mask her contempt now, but she's gone highwire tense.

Edited 2011-12-31 23:00 (UTC)

Hal never actually hired a wedding photographer. His mouth had run off with his hopes, babbling every idea that came to mind, in case she'd smile and nod at one of them. The idea of having pictures of them together was nice, especially to savor when she inevitably turned him down. Having only the poster, to stare at as he fell asleep, didn't always seem like enough.

It really would have been nice if she turned him down a long time before being with someone else, especially not whoever was there for her while he was wasting his time training for her. Instead, she was apparently the sort of woman to flirt with some random dweeb, right in front of him, when he'd just gotten injured, without ever saying anything.

Some random dweeb who she hugged so easily, while he barely got a hand on his shoulder. The question what did that guy do for you that I didn't ran through Hal's head again, but asking was obviously a waste of time. She'd called the guy 'partner.' So they went wandering in dangerous places while he, the guy with superpowers that she could have done it safely, was learning to fly. And that was all she had wanted, someone to investigate with?

"Okay, yeah, you're right! I'm an idiot." Hal's hand hits the table a little harder than necessary, and some of his pinky isn't visible above it. "I should've gone to you as soon as I got my powers and said, hey, what do you want. I just saw what you had with Metro Man and figured that was what you wanted."

Hal deliberately drops the banned name again, spreading his hands and scowling. "Apparently not! Because he wasn't even cold in his grave when you found your new ~partner~."

Yup, this conversation is over.

"Meg--" No, not Megamind, don't say that name, "Bernard could at least man up and own his mistakes. Learn from them. Which is another thing you can't do. I tried to tell you, warn you, give you another chance. I should have known better."

She rises now, fishing into her purse, and dropping a twenty on the table.

"Thanks for the illuminating conversation, Hal. Don't stay in touch."

Time to get the the hell out of Dodge before this goes worse.

"Don't tell me what I can't do...!" Hal grumbles as she finishes her first remarks. His mistakes, that he hasn't even made! As he ignores most of the critiques she made of his personality, he comfortably considers most of their chat to have been bullshit.

Before he expresses any more of those feelings, he notices her slip of tongue and frowns to consider it. Only a few seconds, but long enough for her to get up and start moving away.

"Wait, no, I'm not done talking to you!" His reflexes are far from the fastest in the City, thanks to his typically scattered focus, but this is simple and obvious. Stop Roxanne from leaving so he can Fix This.

Whatever this even is.

He grabs for her nearer wrist, the one with the unfamiliar and vaguely familiar watch on it, to keep her from leaving. With his strength behind it, a successful grab will keep her from pulling away.

"Yes you are--"

Or maybe he's not. She swallows down the sudden cry that threatens to bubble up from deep down inside as she realizes he's not thinking, he's reacting; she's grabbed her and he's holding her tightly-- that big, strong had over her small delicate wrist.

The bones grind and pop; and Roxanne makes a shrill, strangled sound as her eyes fly wide. She squeaks out a breath, going ashen to the lips the sudden crushing pain kicks her body into terror overdrive.

Her purse swings wildly in the crook of her elbow, as she become aware of his feelings intruding. The watch is probably crushed into her flesh, delicate electronics ruined with simple, unyielding pressure.

And then then she shrieks -- people start to panic, and the barista moves for the phone and people start to move from their seats, morning routine disrupted by the sudden scene.

Spidey was almost on the other side of town when he got Roxanne's first message, and worse yet, in a part of the city where there just weren't enough skyscrapers to pick up real swinging speed. He more or less skittered his way over as fast as he was able, bounding across rooftops and outright slingshotting himself forward with two well-placed weblines wherever he could. The buildings blurred by as he finally get into webslinging territory, and he hurtled along at speeds that would make all but some of the faster fliers in the City blanch.

Then he swung around the last corner just in time to hear the screams, and knew he still hadn't made it in time.

Blessedly, the doorway's clear, and he barrels straight through with barely a thought to the shattered glass in his wake. A second miracle -- Roxanne's hurt, and badly, but a broken arm is far better than most of the alternatives, as Spider-Man well knows from personal experience. Now it's up to him to keep any of those possibilities from coming to pass.

Problem: Cosmic-scale opponent -- superstrength, flight, invincibility, eyebeams of some kind. Far out of Spidey's league, on paper and in reality.
Problem: Injured hostage on which opponent has an unhealthy emotional fixation.
Problem: No time to call in the heavyweights.

Solution: Bluff like hell.

"Sorry to crash your party of two, Chuckles, but I'm getting the distinct impression the lady's not interested in whatever you have to offer. Why don't you let her go?"

Hal had forgotten his own strength. People said that all the time, but he never really got what that meant Usually it just meant accidentally breaking stuff, and being a little embarrassed by it. Not people.

He meant for her to be unable to move away. Scaring her a little to get her to take his side of things seriously was a fine extra touch. Injuring her, though, when she was already so inexplicably angry...? She might not forgive him. No matter what he did.

"Oh, whoa, crap crap, I'm so sorry...!"

Hal releases her hand, pulling back from her and rather alarmed by how things changed. The sudden appearance of some costumed guy doesn't help; Hal doesn't know what the guy can do, and he was just seen hurting someone.

"Uh, this is totally not what it looks like, dude."

It was definitely an accident. He didn't know his own strength, things got a little emotional, Roxanne should've known not to go yelling at him and rushing him like this. Whatever he had to convey to get the costumed freak to back off, and keep Roxanne from leaving.

No longer held back-- or supported by someone's massively greatest strength, Roxanne staggers back, face white and hand--

Well, it's best we don't get into what that hand looks like. It's not pretty. Turning funny colors. Blood where the skin was split...

She almost looses her footing, but she beelines for the familiar Spider-Man.

"Let-- Let's just say he's a stand in for Metro Man," she wheezes.

Let Hal wonder.

Let Hal fear. Already she picked up the confusion and the the complete lack of real remorse. But she didn't want him in her head, even if turning his own powers against him would be useful. A last-ditch if there ever was one.

Her voice is low, husky with pain, as she says for an audience of one -- something that hopefully Spider-Man will pick up on quickly in the suggestion: "He still needs to breath."

That webbing has to be good for something, right?

"Really?" Spidey says to Hal. Poised on his toes and arms spread wide, he looked uncannily like his namesake, ready to strike. "'Cause what it looks like is that you just broke my friend's arm! And Roxanne, I'm really sorry," he added without pause, "because this is going to hurt."

Thwip-thwip! Even as he sends globs of webbing flying at Hal's face, he fires a webline with his other hand that snags around Roxanne's waist. Another twist of the wrist and she's yanked back in his direction. It's important to get her out of harm's way as fast as possible, but he still cradles her in his arms as much as he can, trying to absorb the impact.

"But, that wasn't supposed to happen!" Hal unwittingly echoed, protesting any implication that it was his fault.

The random reference to Metro Man suddenly seems a lot more relevant when the newcomer sprays something at Hal's face. Apparently from his wrist?! And Hal remembers that people here have superpowers, not just robot stuff like Megamind has.

Who even knows what this clinging stuff on his face does? It might have a poison or something in it, and it's covering Hal's face.

He panics a little, exclaiming a muffled, "Whoa get it off me." Any plans to keep Roxanne from getting away are dropped as he scrapes at his face, yanking the web off.

Ashen-faced in pain, Roxanne can only go buh? because she's seen him web about before, but she's never had it webbed at her. Taken off her feet, purse flying gone flying in the jump, she's caught--

--but she's bit her lip to hold back the scream. She hurts. But the feeling of being caught, held, is familiar. A safety. She remembers what it's like to be rescued.

But it hasn't been scary in a long time. Today? It's definitely scary.

Spidey eases her back onto her feet, keeping himself between her and Hal. "Stay with me, and I'll get you to the hospital in just a sec," he says, squeezing her uninjured shoulder gently.

His voice drops half an octave as he turns back to address the other man. "Now, can I take Roxanne to the hospital, or are we going to have to throw down? Because I promise you, Hal ol' buddy, you're not going to like that."

If it really comes down to a fight, Spider-Man suspects he'll like it even less -- just so long as Hal doesn't figure that out for himself.

Whether the thread was poison or just suffocation, the weird bug dude's web panicked Hal. Ripping it off his face is his first priority; noticing Roxanne get grabbed, like she was being kidnapped by the guy, is a distant second. Hal might have thought Spiderman was doing just that, if Roxanne hadn't made that 'stand-in' remark.

Okay, he realizes, just grabbing Roxanne again was probably a bad idea. She was still mad, and hurting her again would go over really badly. But they couldn't just end it like this. Instead, Hal's voice rises a few, indignant notes. "Throw down? Look, I'm not trying to hurt her, we just need to talk, and she's not listening, don't leave yet!"

Maybe he'll be lucky, and Spidey's not the sort to break through windows. Maybe a quick hopping flight to the door, blocking them from passing, will be enough.

"Already did, you - asshole," Roxanne says and... well, let's just say that sort of language rarely crosses her lips. She's in pain, scared, and so we'll forgive her for something as mild as that, right? God knows she could call Hal worse.

She swallows thickly, breathing low and trying to stay steady on her feet, cradling her arm against her chest.

"You know they have a special place for guys like you here, right Hal?" she says, backing up Spider-Man verbally, at least. She knew very well Hal could probably really hurt him, and that was the last thing she wanted to see. "THey call it superjail. You'll stop being Titan and go right back to being yourself... and I know he can put you there."

...please, God, don't test that. Please don't call the bluff.

"I'd listen to her if I were you," Spidey said grimly, letting the barest hint of scorn slip into his voice. "You think webbing is all I'm capable of? Make this easier on yourself, chum, and step aside."

Outwardly confident, he held his breath, waiting to see which way Hal would move.

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Now that you've been broken down, Got your head out of the clouds

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1/2 because icon spam.

2/2 tiny spam is tiny.

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Hal-muse keeps insisting that he's being the reasonable one here. ^_^*

Re: Hal-muse keeps insisting that he's being the reasonable one here. ^_^*

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