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Kai is single now. Not by choice, but that's the way things go. He's a sad Elf. A sad gay Elf alone in an era where sad gay Elfs aren't afforded much. He's doing well enough, though. He got the dog in the divorce. He's walking the dog in the park, going quickly past a certain bookstore owned by a certain ex. One day, Kai's going to burn that place down. For now, he just trudges down the path while his little dog trots along happily, unaware that there's anything wrong in the world.
Then a squirrel crosses their path. The dog comes to high alert, barks, and lunges. The leash gives way! Kevin chases the squirrel, and Kai snaps to attention. "Kevin!" he calls. Kevin doesn't listen well on a good day. As far as dogs go he really is pretty worthless. With a squirrel to be chased, the dog pays Kai no mind, and the Elf runs after him haplessly.
Dead Girl is just hanging out in the park, playing her guitar- but then.. a bark! A call in the park she is familiar with! "Keeeevvviiin!" she calls out, waving as Kai and the dog pass, "Hi, Kai! Hi, Kevin!" she beams bright as she stands up, and goes to trot after the pair with a bright smile across her corpse-pale features. "Oh, is he not supposed to chase the squirrels? He loves to chase the squirrels!"
So, it's a moment out of some sort of Rodan nightmare. Out of the sky swoops an immense pair of gray wings, broad enough to give a condor an inferiority complex - stooping on the fleeing dog like a hawk on a mouse. Whatever it is has human-style feet with boots on,at least, not talons. For that's what lands on either side of Kevin. There's a startled yelp from the dog, and then the winged being takes off again in a leap. Kevin is bawling the way only terrified small dogs can.
"Hey," Kai calls to Dead Girl in passing. "I just don't want him off the leash right now. There's scary things in the park this time of ye—" Then something swoops down and snaps up his yelping dog. "Oi! Put him down!" The Elf pushes himself into a faster sprint. As if he could somehow leap into the air and capture the winged creature who has made off with his dog. "That's my dog! You bring him back!" When he reaches the spot where Michael has taken off, and there's nowhere to go but up, he shakes his fist. "I'll sic Captain America on you, you brute!"
Dead Girl gasps! Kevin! Not sweet, innocent Kevin! "Kevin!" she squeaks out, before going suddenly very translucent and flying into the sky. She's not as fast as the winged man, but she can get into the sky at least, "You bring Kevin back! He is innocent and pure!" she calls as she flings herself into the air!"
The….winged person, for so it proves to be, does heed them. Though Michael hovers improbably above them, a story or two's worth of height. Kevin, terrified into shaking insensibility, peers down helplessly at his elf. I will never run away ever again. At least until the next squirrel, promises his expression.
Then, with a little fold to his wings, the angel drifts back down to them, feet landing with a crunch on dry and drifted leaves, and proffers the dog to Kai. "Hello. YOu're not human, are you?" he asks the elf.
Kai glowers at Michael the whole way down. Dognapper! Though he utters a grudging, "Thank you," when he takes the shaking dog into his arms. Kevin immediately starts whimpering and whining and trying to lick Kai's face. He was so scared! It was awful! He'll be a good dog from now on! Until next time! It makes conversing a challenge, so Kai holds Kevin out to Dead Girl so she can take him for a minute. "I'm not," he tells Michael. "Then again, neither are you, and neither is she."
Diving, Dead Girl sinks into the ground and then up again near Kai. She's ready to fight! To protect her friends Kai and Kevin! And then she has Kevin in her arms, wrapping him in a hug and holding him like the precious baby he is! "Aww, it's okay Kevin. Auntie Dead Girl is here." she assures the poochy as she hugs him and kisses him and loves on him as she's always done. She does love this dog.
"He's a good boy, isn't he! You are!" she assures the dog, holding him carefully and giving Michael a real stink-eye. "You gotta lotta nerve, buddy! Kevin is terrified!"
"No, I am not human," Michael agrees, with that maddening serenity. He's looking between them….and while his physical body is only apparently human-sized, there's a weirdly immense presence to him. Then he peers at the dog. "His name is Kevin?" he wonders. Only after a curious inspection does he look up at the young lady holding him. "…..are you really dead? I thought there were very strict rules about what the dead could do here? And moving around and talking aren't part of them." Like being dead is like parking in a loading zone. He turns a look on Kai, as if in search of an explanation. Did the elf do this?
Kai shakes his head. No, he's not responsible for the walking, talking dead girl. However, he's quick to say, "Don't go narcing on her to the authorities. She's fine the way she is, she's not hurting anyone." Stupid authorities. And narcs! The Elf is tetchy today. Kevin meanwhile calms down pretty quickly. He's a dumb dog with the attention span of a gnat, so soon he's wagging at Michael like he's never seen the angel before in his little canine life.
"I'm a lot of things!" Dead Girl says- and as one of the dead, she's not nearly as bothered as the living might be with the angel's natural immencitude. She's not mortal. She's beyond life. She could, in theory, walk through the gates of the Silver City- she's just.. static. Sitting where she is- and naturally so. There is no dark magic, despite the necromantic and necrokinetic energies that swirl around her like a whirlwind. A focal point of deathly energies- an odd and natural part of the world.
She's also very set on making sure Kevin is okay, checking him over and whispering little words love love to the dog- "Don't you worry, Auntie Dead Girl won't let nothin' bad happen to you, Kevin." she says- nodding over to Kai, "Yeah! And don't you bother Kai, either! He's good people!" Dead Girl: Elven Fag Hag.
"…..is that your name? Dead Girl?" The angel remains puzzled. God, the sheer amount of weirdness he's seen, even in this one city. Tentatively, he reaches out a hand to the dog. "What authorities would I tell?" he asks, rather blankly. "If God and Lucifer permit it, who am I to naysay them?" The only 'authorities' large, blond and celestial here answers to, apparently.
Kevin wags his tail and licks Dead Girl's cheek, then he reaches out to lick Michael's approaching hand. He's not a dog who holds a grudge. "Thank you," Kai tells Dead Girl for calling him good people. "I just don't want to lose this little dog. He's all I've got these days. I mean, he's not all I've got, but he's all the family I have here on Earth. My husband left, my boss went back to wherever it is he comes from, Texas or Greece, I've had to move from the Upper West Side back to Hell's Kitchen. I can't lose my dog, too."
"Oh. You got me, too, Kai. I love you." Dead Girl offers to the Elf, "Anything you need, I got your back!" she assures her friend with a bright smile. "Don't worry, I won't let anything happen to Kevin, either. He's too cute." She lifts Kevin and kisses him on the nose! Mwah! "You're too cute!" she says to the scraggly, objectively ugly little dog.
"I'm sorry," Michael says, gently. "I could love you, too." He ….doesn't seem to mean that exactly how it came out. "I am Michael." He says it like it's a title. THE Michael. Kevin gets a scratch under the chin, gently.
"Thank you," Kai says to Dead Girl. "I'd be lost without my friends. And Kevs is so fond of you." Kevin is a happy pooch just now. He's getting attention! From three people, as Kai scrumbles his ears. "I'm Kai," he says. "I think maybe we've met at a party once. Or was it Saganaki? I was a different person back then. Willfully delusional. It's a relief, really, to be free now."
Dead Girl, for the moment at least, is mostly quiet as she slides an arm around Kai for an opportune hug. Hughug! "So. Michael who?" she asks, then, as she takes a slow- and wholly unrequired- breath.
"Well, I mean, you're still the Kai I know, right? Is this a magic elf thing? Like seasonal changes or something?"
Michael smiles at that, with an odd tenderness. "That's right. The little goatman and his wonderful food. I should visit him again. YOu say he's out of town? Too bad. Though I could go find him…." Then he turns that guileless stare on Dead Girl. "The Michael. The first one. I have no surname, though I have many titles."
"Oh, no, it's not Elf magic," Kai says. "I just went through a bad break up. I'm disillusioned and want to burn his house down. I'm going to do it, too. I just need to work out some logistics, like not getting caught. I have a friend who will give me such a look if he finds out I committed arson, even if it was for a good reason." He sighs. Then he offers Michael a small smile. "Yeah, the goatman. He left town. The new managers are okay, but I might quit. I went there to work for him, not them."
"What first one?" Dead Girl asks. She was raised in a sort of odd, Berkley California anarcho-pagan commune." She leans over to Kai, whispering. "Do you know anything about any first Michael?" she wonders, and then she hears all the rest. "Oh. My. God. Kai, you should have told me!" she says suddenly, "We need to do fun things together, now." she says. "Dance clubs, late night ice cream, all that stuff. We can take Kevin to all those places- they all know him already, because we did a *lot* of clubbing when I was dogsitting him." she says with a grin, "Oh! I still have his glasses, too." she says with a grin. "You love your glasses, don't you, Kevin." she kisses Kevin on the head again. She does love this little dog.
"I am the first one God made," Michael says, simply. "Michael. Second eldest, only after the one you call Lucifer." The wings, apparently, can't be blamed on the mutation. Then he peers at Kevin again. "…..glasses? Do dogs wear glasses?" What are you doing to this animal, asks Michael's beseeching gaze.
Kai explains to Dead Girl, "In the Judeo-Christian model of reality, there's an omnipotent God who created, among other things, angels. Michael here is one of those." He's so glib about it all. Elves, what can you do? He smiles at Dead Girl, watching her dote on Kevin, who is eating it up. "I could go for some of that," he says. "I could stand to have a little fun. I just don't have the money anymore. He used to pay for everything. Fortunately, I did tuck away a nest egg all the while, on the off chance that he dumped me." To Michael, he says, "This dog wears glasses, apparently."
"Lucifer. Oh, OH. Okay." Dead Girl seems happy to accept that this must be some kind of angel, and that the devil walks the earth. She's apparently totally cool with that.
But, she sees the dead walking around all the time, and one would be hard pressed to call her 'typical'. "Oh, I'll cover you. What are friends for?" she asks of Kai, "I mean, it's not like I spend my money on anything other than partying constantly anyways. I don't need to eat or sleep or anything." she reminds the Elf, "And I do have a job in Mutant Town. I'll vouch for you and you can hang out there while I work, if you don't have anywhere else to go." she says with a beaming smile. "And yeah, Kevin loves his glasses, and his carrying bag, don't you Kevin?" she asks of the dog. "He's the coolest dog in Manhattan, aren't you?" Another shower of kisses for Kevin. No wonder he likes Dead Girl! Most animals don't really take to her, but Kevin is just a bundle of oddball.
"Anyways, it's the least I can do for a friend, Kai." She smiles still, looking then up to Michael, "So.. What's it like being.. you know… Unborn?"
She's apparently asked a stumper, with that one. Michael looks bewildered. "I don't know," he says, looking downat himself. "Rather….I haven't thought much about it. I wasn't, and then I was named, and then I was, and Samael was smiling at me. Most of the things born in the world don't remember their birth, so I don't suppose it's very different?" he offers, with an oddly hopeful tone. Like it's important that he answer this properly. "What's….what do you like to do for fun?" The answers he gets to this question, in turn, are always interesting.
"You're the sweetest," Kai tells Dead Girl. "I won't take too much advantage. I really do need to be saving my money against an uncertain future, and it's not fair to turn around and spend yours. I can't go crawling back to my family with my hat in my hand. They'll never let me come back here. I don't mind being homeless, personally, but it's Kevin I have to think about, isn't it? Besides, I do have a place to stay on the Upper East Side, so I'm not entirely destitute." To Michael, he says, "I used to love doting on my beloved. Now I love the idea of burning his house down. It'll go up fast. It's filled with books. I also like cooking, and I'm a artist."
"Oh. I do stuff all the time." Dead Girl offers first to Michael, before smiling brightly to Kai, "Oh, don't worry about it. It's not like I need it for anything- There a thousand places for a corpse to hang her head in New York City." she teases, "Anyways, you're on the rebound. So, we clearly need to get you back in the game." she says, "I know all the best bars that would just love to see a cute, newly single Elf." she assures her friend, before looking back to Michael.
"Sometimes I go and talk to the dead- very interesting people the deceased. I like to surf. I torture the man who murdered me- that's always good for a laugh- hrm.. Play with kids, I guess. I like kids, they're usually pretty keen to hang out with me. Parent's are a little iffy about it, though." she just keeps going, "Dancing, singing, playing music, hanging out with friends. I used to do a lot more drinking and smoking, but they don't really work on me any more, so, I just hang out with the drunk and the stoned and try to get that contact high." Still petting Kevin.
"Oh, sometimes I actually help the dead. You know, ghosts and stuff who need to move on. I explore the astral realm, sometimes, it's a neat and weird place. Sort of laid on top of the rest of us." And she sees it pretty much all the time. Those baleful, glowing red eyes gazing into Michael. Almost as if she could see the real him. Almost.
"What about you? I mean, you're a literally ageless being who apparently was never born and I assume had all the knowledge and ability required to complete whatever task you were created for just.. there. Honestly, that sounds *super* tragic. Are you okay? Do you need a hug? Does God ever hug angels?"
"The astral is fascinating," Michael agrees. He sounds….overwhelmed. This is apparently beyond some weirdness threshold for him. "I am fine." Then he smiles again, as if on surer ground. "I am on vacation. I do like hugs. I don't *need* them, but they are nice. No, but we do hug each other. Often. It sounds like you both keep busy."
"I have a friend who goes into the astral realm sometimes," Kai asides to Dead Girl. "Not for funsies or anything like that. It's all business with this guy." He then tells Michael, "I used to be so much more active, but I gave that rotten son of a bitch my every waking hour. I gave him devotion like even you angels can't fathom. I literally died for him. It didn't take, but I didn't know it at the time. Well, I hope he knows I've learned nothing. I'm going back to my old life, and it's going to be fun."
"Yeah!" Dead Girl says towards Kai, grinning wide. "That's the spirit!" she claps- still somehow holding Kevin. Hugging her friend Kevin. "Okay, so, I'm going to get a few things, Kai- where should I meet you?" she asks of the Elf, "We can get started right away. We'll start first with Ice Cream- so, I'll go and get a bunch of that." she says with a smile. "Ooh! And any other snacks you like, so, better tell me quick!" she says with a bright smile, "I'll also bring you your favorite snacks, Kevin." she assures the pooch as she offers him over to Kai.