fall in line or release the glitch

[gramarye]

Who: Wolfgang and Will, Shrieky, Olivia Dunham (prime), Stephanie Brown, open
What: Everyone's going to pick daisies and go on a picnic in the woods!
Where: Wherever is convenient! He's mostly in the southeast part of the city, but can be anywhere.
When: Various days over the second week of the siege.
Notes: If you want a thread starter ping me and I will make you one :3 or... idk just tag in somewhere random.
Warnings: Violence, mild horrors (like, relatively, yes), also some vague discussion of mental illness stuff in the OP.

After his Awakening, he sleeps.

When he wakes up, he's disoriented -- the room is unfamiliar, he's lying on a cot in a safehouse in Mog Hill, which someone explains to him when he asks. He has mercifully been left alone most of the time, except for someone who would come to check to make sure he hadn't actually died. That makes him pause and ask how long he was out.

Three days. He slept for three days. That's three days of being utterly useless and vulnerable, with no one knowing where he is, he doesn't know where he is -- three days of Baedal going to Hell.

Three days of dreamless sleep.

He wept. He's too embarrassed to ever admit it, and he thankfully held it together until he was alone, but he did. Whether it was out of frustration, or anger, or fear, or relief, he's still not sure. Too much emotion all at once when he's spent the last three years buried under the fog his medication produces in him -- blunted affect is a side effect of much of them. He doesn't typically feel much of anything, and he'll continue to not feel much of anything as soon as he can get back on them.

One of the women later finds him hunched over a table, making small, hysterical noises. There's a glass of wine and a jug of water on the table; she can't tell if he's laughing or crying. When she asks what happened, he glances at the glass and says in a voice like a dull razor, "Well, it's been done."

After that, they gently suggest he stay away from sharp objects.

Still, he refuses to have a mental breakdown in the middle of a citywide crisis -- if he's going to indulge (which he very well might) it will have to be at a more convenient time. Compartmentalization it is.

Wolfgang puts himself to work immediately. He can be useful. He has combat experience, specialized training. He has magic, apparently, although he hasn't really felt out the limits of what he can do (he is very afraid that the answer may be everything), there are a few things that come in immediately useful. It is very strange to think of himself as telepathic, but that's the word they use. He can listen for danger and hear people in need of help all without even stepping outside. He can imprint simple but strong impulses in the walls of the building itself, calm the hysterical, reduce the pain of the injured. Boil water, grow food, keep the light and heat on when the power occasionally goes out. So many useful little things. They don't always work the way he intends -- he finds, with great chagrin, that magic never quite wants to do what he wants it to do -- but it's serviceable.

Mostly, he looks after the children. They like him, especially the very young ones who aren't quite grown enough to understand what's going on -- he keeps them calm and entertained and out of their parents' hair for a while. He runs into a family he used to sit for in Bonetown and the little girl runs up, punches him in the leg, shouts "That's for missing my recital!" and stomps off to a corner to pout. He spends the next half hour sitting through an extremely dramatic reenactment of her big solo, interjecting with the appropriate amount of reverent awe for her skill and wit, while her mother finally gets a few private moments in the bathroom. Her eyes are red when she comes out; he doesn't mention it.

As the infestation goes on, though, it becomes clear to him that he can't stay here the entire time.

Or rather, that he won't.

Comments

[gramarye]

'Sponsors' makes it sound a bit more like a sugar daddy relationship, but maybe that's just his weird mind. Pause. He eyes her costume. "Can I ask about that, by the way, or is it too weird?" Boldly going where even Martel won't, evidently.

As far as his magic... he frowns and shrugs. "Maybe." It was almost certainly the final push for his Awakening, but he doesn't even want to think how long this has been building.

[controlledvariable]

Please don't say that outloud, Wolfgang, Steph would have to bleach her brain. But she just shrugs, "Sure, what exactly do you wanna know? Although I might have to be vague on some details. The mask is for a reason." It's been weird to get used to people having no idea what a superhero is, but she's working on it.

"It came at a good time. I mean, as good as any time can be to wake up one day and have powers," At least now he's got a way to fight against the monsters that keep falling into Baedal.

[gramarye]

"Why a bat?" Really, that's what you're going to focus on? Honey. As far as weird things go, superheroes are way down at the bottom of his list right now -- they only exist where he's from in movies and comic books, but the idea makes more sense than, say, the presence of enormous flesh-eating, magic-casting dragons. Or whatever else is here right now.

"They'd be more convenient if they came with an instruction manual." Well, now he just sounds grumpy. He sighs and runs a hand through his hair, stops and makes a face when his hand comes away sticky. Welcome to impractical hair problems.

[controlledvariable]

"They're scary," Criminals are a superstitious and cowardly lot, or so she's heard, "I'm the third Batgirl, so I didn't come up with the name or the emblem. Or the ears." She points to the ears, her expression amused because seriously. Those ears.

"You should talk to someone when this all blows over, there are plenty of people around who might know a little about what you can do," the first person she thinks of is Martel; he always seems to know what he's doing. She looks sympathetic in response to his hair situation, "You should braid it, if you're gonna be running around fighting monsters."

Says the girl with her hair sticking out the back of her cowl -- although at least it's away from her face. And she does braid it when things get really serious.

[gramarye]

"Fair enough," he says, giving the costume a considering look. The ears, after all, are pretty silly, but without them she'd look less like a bat and more like a chick with a cape. "It probably helps, um, when it's not the middle of the day."

It's a nice day. Or it would be, if it weren't for all the horrible death.

"Mm." He fully plans on ignoring all this and pretending it doesn't exist as soon as this invasion crap blows over. Denial is fun! "I keep losing hair ties, I swear," he says as he wipes his hands off on his pants. Pretty much everything he wears is ruined by the end of the day anyway; Baedal's dry cleaning businesses are going to be having a very good month if they all survive this.

[controlledvariable]

"Yeah, it's designed for night time and creeping in the shadows and stuff. I always feel a bit silly running around in this get up during the day," And in a place where people apparently think it's a sex thing. At least no one's said that out loud to her, although she's gotten a lot of odd looks. Thank god she doesn't have a costume like Black Canary's, or Starfire's.

"Here," Steph fishes in one of the pouches on her belt and pulls out a little ball of hair elastics. She takes one off and offers it to Wolfgang, "I'm seriously considering just shaving all mine off so I don't have to worry aout it." This is so untrue, and probably a bit of a terrible joke, but that's how Steph rolls.

[gramarye]

In fairness, the bondage fetish gear aspect is probably also not Steph's fault, Bruce. You weirdo. He shrugs. "If it works, it works."

He can think of a couple reasons why someone might not want their face associated with this line of work.

Wolfgang smiles genuinely -- all teeth -- as he takes it. "Oh, thank you!" His hair takes a bit of wrangling to get pulled all the way out of his face -- it's thin, it just. Has a mind of its own. "I can't say I haven't had the same thought. But now that would just be quitting." You heard it here first, people, the real reason he refuses to cut it anymore is spite.

[controlledvariable]

"It worked back home. My luck varies here," like don't fuck with me. Steph really misses that aspect, although she misses the hope she inspired even more. Batman is about being scary, and Steph can work that line too, but she'll always smile for civilians and stick around to chat with kids, if she has the time.

That gets another laugh, because of course he keeps it long out of spite; Steph definitely approves, "When I started out, I tried to keep all my hair under my mask, but it was terrible. Eventually I had to cut a hole in the back to let my ponytail out."

[gramarye]

"Not enough teeth to frighten people here, I think." And that gets him imagining giant bats with shark teeth, which... he shudders and ruthlessly suppresses that image before he wills it into reality or something. (Can he do that now? Oh God, don't let him be able to do that now.)

His mouth quirks upwards. "The ponytail might not be helping, either, then."

[controlledvariable]

"It's hard to compete with creatures from the abyss," Not that she knows if they're from the abyss, it just sounds like the sort of place monsters come from.

"I think you'll find my ponytail inspires fear and terror in the hearts of criminals," She manges to sound so serious, which is an achievement considering how ridiculous what she's saying is.

[gramarye]

To his credit, he doesn't flinch at the word 'criminals'. "Right, they'll see it as a banner of war and --" Wolfgang stops mid-sentence and cocks his head to the side as if hearing something urgent. His attention completely arrested, it's a while before he moves again.

Then he does move, turning north. "I know," he says cryptically, and it's clearly addressed to somebody, but not her. There's nobody else around. He shakes his head. "There's something going on to the north," he says, this time to Steph. "About a half a mile. I can't tell if it's serious..."

[controlledvariable]

Steph blinks when he stops, but she's used to Kara's puppy dog style headtilt when she hears something with superhearing, so Steph assumes something like that is going on and doesn't worry too much. The fact he speaks to somebody that she can't see has her raising an eyebrow, curious, but well. It's not very high on the list of weird shit that's been happening this week.

"We should go check it out?" There's a hint of a question, although she's not entirely sure why it's a question. Maybe she's just asking about the 'we' part of the sentence, in case Wolfgang has had enough monsters for today.

[gramarye]

His hesitation comes less from an unwillingness to help -- that's why he's out here, he's helping where he can -- and more from an uncertainty as to whether he would be helpful. But, no, as long as he doesn't have to engage in hand-to-hand combat, he can be useful. He has a lot of range.

He has a quick conversation inside his own head, which does nothing for his whole maybe I'm crazy thing.

"Yes," he says after a moment, firmly.

[controlledvariable]

She smiles, a big, bright smile that probably looks a little incongruous with their entire surroundings at the moment, but when there are monsters to fight, Steph is just pleased to have some back up.

"Lead the way," Her smile fades after a moment, but only because she's trying to look like she's taking this seriously. She considers asking exactly what sort of magic he can do, but he did say this is a new thing, so she doesn't think she'd get much of a solid answer.

[gramarye]

The best he could answer is basically a Kanye shrug. He remembers everything about his childhood, now, but has found that he can no longer do a lot of what he used to -- which, he supposes, is from that long sleep.

That instruction manual would be super handy.

His smile is less enthusiastic and more forced -- he's awfully tired, but he's always tired -- and then he heads in that direction, following the clutter in his head and not trying to navigate by sight... because his sense of direction is terrible and he'd just get them lost that way. Whatever it is, between the two of them, it shouldn't be much bother to sweep up.

[controlledvariable]

All of life would probably be easier with an instructional manual. Maybe there's a Magic for Dummies book floating around in Baedal somewhere.

Steph follows, automatically going into Bat mode; her footfalls almost silent and her whole body thrumming with energy ready to be expelled at anything that might jump out at them. Wolfgang seems like he's more focused on their destination, and she doesn't want to be waylaid by any stray monsters before they can get there.

"You should go somewhere safe to get some rest, after this," it's her way of saying you kind of look like shit, but she noticed how forced his smile was and doesn't want him to burn himself out.

[gramarye]

"I'm fine." He smiles to show exactly how fine he is. That might have been a tactical error, because the answer is "not very". He can push through it, he's been in worse states before, and he'll likely stay on his feet until he actually does just pass out somewhere, less out of a stubborn refusal to know his limits and more a misplaced sense of guilt. Like in doing so, he'll be making up for something else he did wrong.

Her near-silent walking is sort of creepy. Then again, he's sort of creepy, so who is he to judge.

North and slightly west is a mild altercation -- nothing that needs more firepower than either of them have, but something the people in danger, mostly armed with whatever they had lying around their homes, are incapable of dealing with on their own. More of those damn mutant frog things.

This time he is not going to explode anything from the inside out because it's gross, it makes a huge mess, they might have toxic or acidic blood or something, and it really freaks him out.

[controlledvariable]

"Uh huh," in her sceptical-as-hell voice, which should let him know that he definitely doesn't look fine, and she is probably going to wrangle him to a safe house once this little mission is over. She likes Wolfgang, she's not letting him drop dead in the street, and Steph is one of the most stubborn people out there.

As soon as the frogs come into sight, she casts around for a good spot to hide and assess the situation. An overturned carriage is the best they've got for now, and she heads there, assuming Wolfgang will follow.

"I hate those things," she comments, once they've got some cover, "But they're easy enough to kill." At least, compared to some of the other things she's run into.