2014.03.22 - God Of Steel And Smoke

You would think that a murky global security agency on the bleeding edge of technological innovation would have entirely done away with the need to actually trudge across the city and pick up paper copies of files. Sadly, you would be mistaken, as Agent Henrietta Black can attest to. A helicopter from the floating security nexus that is the Argus down to the city below, into an SUV and the slow crawl across the city with the constant threat of impalement by taxi, security checks, elevators, up to the top floor of a sleek black office building followed by another round of badge-showing, all for the manila envelope now clutched under one arm.

It’s not, perhaps, the most efficient use of her time, but at least she has it.

And, while she’s perched at such a lofty height with such an iconic view spread out before her, she can’t quite resist the temptation to dawdle at least a little. She slips out a door, onto a patio at the very top of the tower, letting the chill Atlantic wind tug wildly at her hair as she gazes out at the Statue of Liberty with the faintest smile affixed to her painted lips.

Jack Hawksmoor likes to occupy himself occasionally running along the sides of buildings, capering to and fro. He doesn't actually need exercise, nor particularly relish the wind whipping through the hair, but going from building to building is like touching base, a little bit of duck, duck goose with the various denizens of the city. As he's going near this particular tower, however, he hears the signals of a particularly familiar frequency. He long since unlocked the encryption for SHIELD communiques, but, having recently had a rather unpleasant encounter with an Agent Danvers...well, he just has to take a peek.

God forbid he miss a chance to get under her skin again.

He runs up along the side of the building until he reaches the top, overshooting the ledge a bit and landing in a crouch, "Ta da!" he says, arms outstretched, only to see Henrietta, "Hmmmmmmm...you don't seem like an unpleasant, imperious bitch. But I've been wrong before."

One moment Etta is having one of those majestic movie moments, with the wind in her hair and the sunlight glinting in her eyes and the panoramic vista spread out before her... and then Jack happens. She half-stumbles a few steps back from the railing of the building with a gasp, her hand instinctively going beneath her coat as she sinks down into a precarious looking half-crouch in her heels. That’s as far as she gets before the incongruity of some sort of attack being prefaced with ‘Ta Da’ sinks in.

”What? I’m sorry but... what?” She says over the thrum of her adrenaline-amplified heartbeat. She looks Jack up and down as she assumes a more upright stance and just mutters, “Bloody, buggery hell. Are you some sort of magician? Or those people that illicitly climb buildings to get on the news? I’d mention I might have shot you, ducks, but I don’t imagine you got into this line because of your paramount concern for safety...”

Jack Hawksmoor considers, "Hmmmmmmmmmm...I don't know if I illicitly climb buildings. I mean, some of them might get a thrill out of it, but it never really felt illicit. I should try harder, though, I'd hate for any of the buildings to feel unsatisfied," he says. His hands thrust in his pockets, "Not a magician, although I think I'd do well on stage. Got the face for it, the demeanor, the posture, whole nine. You're SHIELD, right? I heard some sort of squawk about picking you up. They're going to be a little late, terrible windshear coming off the carrier, gonna delay takeoff at least twenty minutes. Allow for travel time and you've got at least a forty five minute wait. I could get you a coffee."

For the first few sentences, Etta looks reluctantly fascinated by the barefoot interloper, even amused when he starts talking about tending to the satisfaction of his various structural conquests like a sultan fretting about his harem. That quickly turns to wariness when he starts informing her about the delay in her helicopter home, however, and all /that/ implies. Her chin dips down a fraction of an inch and her head turns so that she’s regarding him with a slightly sidelong glance that says she might be regretting not pulling her gun after all.

”Weather, traffic AND refreshments. You’re a veritable full service daredevil, aren’t you?” She asks as her eyes give him another thorough up-and-down pass. Her mouth purses into a bow as she considers appropriate next moves and finds no clear direction or answer. “Instead of asking if you come here often, which might sound a bit trite, dare I enquire how you come to know so much about me and my daily itinerary. Hopefully that won’t be so forward that it’d push me into the unpleasant, imperious bitch category, but I find myself dreadfully curious, Mr....?”

Jack Hawksmoor grins insouciantly, 'Hawksmoor. Jack. Reverse that. Jack Hawksmoor. God of the City. Lovely to make your acquaintance, Miss...or is it Doctor? A lot of psychological and medical applications on your phone there for a layman, I would say, but the presence of knowledge does not necessarily equate the presence of a degree. And I know things because I can hear the communications between the helicopter and your ship and the text that should be arriving at your phone...now," he says, and there's a requisite tone or buzz that would accompany such a communication.

"I'm really not meaning to be disturbing, I just find it tiresome to go through long, boring introductions. And no, you're far from Miss Danvers' class of bitchery, thus far, although I suspect she might have her own species of the overall genus bitcheteratus. Bitcheteratus Danverius. Yes, that sounds good."

He may be dangerous. However, the longer he goes on, the harder it becomes to focus on him as a potential threat because... holy hell is this interesting. Her eyes slightly wider than a moment previously, Etta looks from Jack to the Stark phone she withdraws from her pocket and reads:

AGENT STONE: BE ADVISED RETURN FLIGHT DELAYED 45 MIN DUE WIND SHEAR.

Her scarlet mouth goes just a bit slack for an instant before she looks back to him in utter astonishment. And then promptly begins to laugh.

”That’s... I mean I have to confess I am not /entirely/ sure this isn’t some dreadfully elaborate ruse but... either way... that’s astonishing. You really could have a go at a career trodding the boards, Mr. Hawksmoor.”

She gives a little shake of her head, advancing on him a step before belatedly answering him. “It could be Doctor, yes, but in practice we’re all Agents. Egalité, Fraternité and all that. So Agent Black will do just as well, and if we can make it through this conversation without you attempting to fling me over the railing then I might even allow for Henrietta as an option.” A beat and she adds, “And I’m sorry if you had such a Jurassically terrible meeting with Agent Danvers. She has a bit on her plate at the moment, so please make allowances.”

Jack Hawksmoor smiles, "I won't, but it's very kind of you to stick up for your royally rotten colleague. Speaks well of you that you're protective even of your more unsavory compatriots, though. Agent Black does sound very official, I suppose, but I won't pry and ferret out anything so personal as a given name," he says, "Yet.'

"As for the railing, the thought never even crossed my mind. It is a lovely view, though, undoubtedly. The ocean licking up against the shore, the ships at sea, the smell of the garbage scow. It makes me almost giddy. Of course, I usually am, so that's not remarkable. Dare I ask what brings our nation's premiere intelligence Gestapo to send an agent, even one as lovely as yourself, to trod precious asphalt without a phalanx of heavily armed types?"

What’s the harm in allowing herself to be a little charmed? She indulges in a small smile at the oblique compliment and allows her gaze to drift from him to the horizon for a moment. “It /is/ stunning, isn’t it? Though I can’t quite bring myself to agree with you about the garbage boat, but the rest... yes. Quite.”

She draws in a deep breath of air nonetheless, savoring its cold bite. “And rather mundane things bring me here, I’m afraid, though I’m suddenly I don’t have anything interesting to trade, like a story of running a double agent to ground in front of the lobby coffee cart.” She gives him the most fleeting of grins before adding, “Though I flatter myself that, if pressed, I could put up a good showing in the physical defense department. We can’t go about in body armor and thigh holsters down here unless absolutely necessary. It tends to make people in the vicinity quite unsettled. Sort of like when you’re enjoying a view and a giddy barefoot man crawls up over the 47th floor railing. Would it be out of line if I were to ask about your amorous adventures in architecture or how it is that you can read cellular signals like they were a copy of the times someone left about?”

Jack Hawksmoor smiles slightly and draws out a pack of cigarettes, slightly crumpled. He places one between his lips and lights it up, inhaling sharply. He takes nearly a third of the length in a single draw and, when he speaks, no smoke at all escapes, absorbed into him utterly, tar and toxins and all, "Misspent youth. Not that unusual, really. Getting into trouble at school, neighborhood fights, latchkey kid with overworked single mother, late night abductions by post-futuristic chrononauts bending time and space to rip me open and wrap my guts around quantum-nuclear pseudo-intelligence hypertech. Puberty. The usual. Result is that I can hear the city, and get it to do what I want. Most of the time. New York can be stubborn. San Francisco's a peach, though, so nice. And London's nuts, ohhhhhhh, so big," he laughs, "I felt like my head was trying to open wide. I loved it," he says.

And, for the record, when I think of your thighs (and I will), holsters aren't what I imagine with them. Although there is a certain appeal, I can see..."

The progression of expressions that her fair face goes through as he embarks on his answer are as follows: Fasciation at the outset, concern regarding the bits about being abducted and stuffed like a Christmas goose with bits and bobs from the distant future which persists right through to his mention of London, which nets the briefest return to a smile. It lingers only until he begins to wax poetic about her thighs, which inspires brief wide-eyed shock followed by a sudden /peal/ of laughter.

”It must be a terrible burden to be so shy and retiring, Mr. Hawksmoor.” She says when she’s finally recovered, daubing a tear of mirth from the corner of her eye daintily with the back of a finger. “A genuine burden. Though if I get home anytime soon, I’ll convey your fondest regards to London. I am half beginning to expect that she’s probably pining for you...” A thought occurs to her and she ventures, “You wouldn’t happen to know a charming slip of a thing called Violet, would you? I expect it’s a bit like hearing someone’s from Beijing and asking if they happen to know a Mr. Wong, but my day has been exceedingly unlikely thus far and it seems worth a go.”

Jack Hawksmoor considers for a moment, running through his long list of acquaintances, pals, enemies, occasional lover, observations and encounters, "I can't say that I do, offhand, or, at the least, not one that's been memorable enough to spark an immediate response. And I was shy, once upon a time, long before all this, when I was just a kid not yet impaled upon the horns of outrageous fortune. But I've found it does me damn little good. I've learned to value the esteem of the cracks in the sidewalk more than most humans. The cracks in the sidewalk usually have more to say. And they do wicked impressions."

For all that it’s unlikely she has any experience with the comedy stylings of paving materials, Etta seems to have some understanding of Jack’s assessment of human nature. One corner of her mouth lifts a little as she ponders it, her expression going a touch rueful as she concludes, “Despite having an ingrained idea of a self-concept about what they are and what they believe, most people are dreadfully mutable. They’re driven by immediate needs, and only get around to trying to rationalize their actions against their ideals after the fact.” This is, it would seem, a sort of cumbersome agreement with his point. She lifts her brows before adding, “I can’t speak to the contrast between that and concrete, but I would imagine that concrete is a bit more consistent. Though is everything really a woman? Buildings, cities... or is it just a way of referring to things, like how ships are always supposedly feminine...”

Jack Hawksmoor shakes his head, "Oh, no, not at all. The Empire State building is quite masculine, if its shape didn't give you enough clue. I suppose they don't really have genders, but 'it' always seems so...inanimate. And the world is not inanimate, much as humans like to pretend it is. But just because you can't hear someone talking, doesn't mean they aren't speaking. Concrete is generally quite dull itself, but the cracks...the cracks see and collect things." he grins. "I admit, though, I probably don't spend quite enough time around humans to fully appreciate their charms."

Having a number of minutes left to kill, Etta wanders over to sit perched on the edge of a decorative planter box and consider Jack from a different angle. “You know, I should confess that I still haven’t quite made up my mind that this isn’t some sort of trick predicated on... God knows what ulterior motive. But if it isn’t... it’s absolutely fascinating.” She folds one leg neatly over the other with a faintly serpentine hiss of stocking on stocking and furrows her brows faintly. “Is it any and every inanimate object? And how do you separate one thing from another in that case? The crack from the concrete, the bolt from the building.” She looks down the length of a leg and then back up at him and asks with a hint of playful humor, “Do my Louboutins know just how much I adore them?” This would be one of her scarlet-soled black stilettos, to judge from the way she dandles her foot in the air when she says it.

Jack Hawksmoor smiles, cocking his head at the shoe, "Ah, I’m afraid your shoes aren't quite a part of the city, but more a part of you, and so I cannot hear their particular tune. Not everything speaks all at once, and usually it's more of a harmonious song than a cacophony. Sometimes it isn't words, but images or feelings or...senses. I don't know how to describe senses you don't possess to you. But," he says, and he flicks his hand out. A satellite dish across the street uproots itself, unfolding and reconfiguring, even as a smokestack on the same roof starts to bend and detach, reforming and shaping until they are two faux duelists facing off with each other, a sword of wire and a sword of steel bending together, "'You seem a decent fellow. . I hate to kill you.' 'You seem a decent fellow. I hate to die'." he quotes from memory.

The sudden animation of building materials at once lends a good deal of credibility to what he’s saying and, at the same time, does a good deal to dampen her whimsical approach to the conversation. “Oh dear.” She mutters with a hint of a sigh and a frown of concern. “That’s terribly impressive, Mr. Hawksmoor, but please have a care not to drop anything on some hapless stockbroker popping out for a coffee, will you? And... well, are you able to put your toys away as you found them when you’re done?”

Jack Hawksmoor laughs, "I assure you, I'm quite aware of the place and position of everyone in the vicinity. If somehow, something were to go astray, I could intervene with ease for the protection of our stockbroker's expensively coiffed head. And, yes, everything can be as it was," he says, and there's a flicker of an eyelid, momentarily, rapid-fire like a tic and the satellite and chimney disengage and re-align, returning to their original forms with a slight creak. "I admit, I may have lost a little rust from the chimney. Not a great loss, though," he smiles. "I do not exaggerate in what I am. In our age of wonders, does it surprise you that new gods might walk among men?"

Henrietta Black breathes a sigh of mild relief that’s chased with a faintly apologetic smile. “Terribly sorry. When you’re ostensibly tasked with ensuring the safe and orderly operation of the world it sometimes interferes with heartfelt appreciation of a terribly neat trick. But now that that’s sorted...” She lets her blue-green eyes go wide as she looks from him to the recently dancing building materials and then back to him. “Bloody hell.”

She watches for a moment without commenting on the rest, just letting the spectacle unfold before she allows the wonder in her face to be replaced by something more pensive. “Well, I don’t know if any of your building-lady-friends keep up with the news, but we’ve had a spot of bother with ‘Gods’ of late. And I’ve lost a... dear friend. So, while I believe it, I don’t know if I am favorably disposed to the idea.” Her voice is soft, and there is sadness there, though it’s not raw anymore. She looks at him a long moment before saying, “You’re clearly immensely powerful. But what you’ve told me doesn’t sound like Godhood. Which I would expect is just as well. I can’t imagine anything lonelier and more demanding than Godhood. I don’t think I would wish it on anyone.”

Jack Hawksmoor smiles softly, "Do I seem to be surrounded by friends and family to you? I suppose, in a way, I am. Godhood it is, but, the issue, naturally, is that I'm not a god of people. I'm a god of cities. And yes, people are a part of cities, they build them, they found them, they assemble them, but that's as if saying that a god of men is a god of cells or of bones or of blood. People are just a part of my demesne, one of the more selfish parts, and they get lots of attention from lots of other quarters. I am sorry about your friend, however. Loss is never easy," he says, "It is part of life, though. All humans walk through that shadowed door someday. And the cities shall endure." he sighs, "I admit, I'm not very comforting, though. I'd do terribly as a talk show host."

All the whimsy has bled out of her expression, leaving her looking melancholy and thoughtful as the wind runs its insubstantial fingers through her hair. “That all sounds awful.” She says with quiet familiarity. A sigh spills from her painted lips and she adds with a wry and rueful note to her words, “... And oddly familiar. Not that I have any delusions of godhood, but I do know a bit about feeling... removed from the rest of the world, I suppose you would say. Distant.”

She lets her gaze wander to the view again, listening to the whistle of the wind before she says, “You can know something, both intellectually and from any number of examples, and still, it would seem, find yourself unprepared for the something to actually happen. Nobody I know lives a safe and comfortable life. And yet I can honestly say that it never once occurred to me that that would be the last time I’d ever see him. How utterly moronic of me.”

Jack Hawksmoor shakes his head, "Not moronic. Hopeful. And there's nothing wrong with hope, either. Oh, I know I sounded a bit grim 'n' gritty there for a moment. I'm afraid I have rather a habit of that, on occasion, when I get on my 'humanity sucks' kick. Tends to be a defensive reaction," he says. He finishes his cigarette, tossing the butt into his mouth and chewing it like a piece of gum, "Everyone feels distant. And everyone's close together. Webs and interconnectedness. I should be saying something profound here, but really, it all boils down to 'that sucks'."

The bit with the cigarette is actually an amazingly helpful distraction. She watches him chew the smoldering thing up and is momentarily so viscerally and visibly disgusted that it blots out everything else and all she can do is wholeheartedly mutter, “Ughhhh....”

She wrinkles her nose and sits up a bit straighter on her perch. “Forgive me. Ninety-nine percent of the people I speak to on any given day are colleagues. And for them, I have to be a particular thing. Efficient, informed, dispassionate, occasionally deadly. What I can’t be generally is sentimental. But you know... it’s always easier to be completely honest with a relative stranger, whiling away the time waiting for the next bus with revealing your innermost thoughts and then parting, never to see each other again.”

“What are bus stops like? I imagine they see more than their fair share of things. Though I wonder if they care a jot. The city might be rather indifferent to the people that fill it.” Another thought furrows her brows and she asks, “What do you do when you’re not vertically romancing buildings, Mr. Hawksmoor? Do you have some urban Mt. Olympus somewhere where you majestically recline and drink motor oil by the gallon?”

Jack Hawksmoor laughs, "Motor oil is actually quite tasty, although I prefer car exhaust, as a rule, or the muck inside a nice industrial smokestack. Yes, I am afraid my biology is a little queer. I can drink New York City tap water, but that probably means that you shouldn't. Same applies to street vendor hot dogs. Delicious. Definitey not meat," he says. When he sits, you can see the bottoms of his bare feet, treaded like a tire but with a metallic sheen. "I technically qualify as homeless, I guess, but I lack for nothing. The city entire is my home and provides all I could need. I don't generally sleep and, when I do, I prefer to do it under open stars. I'm frightfully allergic to nature - nothing makes me sick faster than a nice, green forest - so getting as high as I can and getting a look at the world above...that's as close as I come..."

“I feel like we might have difficulty agreeing on a restaurant were we to dine together.” Etta says by way of understatement. She’s not shy about looking him over, studying the fascinating marks affixed to the bottom of his feet shamelessly for a moment or two as she listens. “Even Central Park? It’s very green, but at the same time, unquestionably part of the city.” A quandary, that. She returns his eyes to his and says mildly, “You were, you seemed to imply, just a normal boy once upon a time. A normal little boy who’s gone on to acquire some decidedly unique habits and hobbies, but... a human all the same. Have you entirely rejected that part of yourself?”

Jack Hawksmoor smiles, "I admit, I don't tend to eat at restaurants much, but I don't mind watching other people eat. There are actually a couple of restaurants in the city who know me and accomodate my...special tastes. In discreet ways, so as not to horrify the rest of the customers," he smiles. "Central Park is...complex. I can handle it, but it's like being in a particularly uncomfortable set of clothes. It itches, I feel a little queasy...Sometimes I have to stick my head down into the sewer to catch a nice breath..." he considers.

"As for humanity...I'm not sure. I don't think so, not consciously. I still remember being him, and he's still in here...somewhere. I think he's kind of amazed by what he's become...and probably a bit horrified. it's definitely not the quiet life of computer programming he'd imagined."

“I imagine he might be. It would be a lot to absorb, pardon the pun.” Etta says with a gentle, soft-focus sort of an expression and tone. She carries on with looking at him, not rushing to fill up the silence with words, though after the tick of a few seconds she adds, “I read people, after a fashion. Hearts on faces, or in voices and movements, that sort of thing. So I can’t help but look for him when I look at you. And worry a little over what it would be like to be drowning in motor oil in the mechanized heart of a newly forged God.” A sad smile touches her mouth and she adds, “I rather want to wrap him up in a bit of a cuddle just talking about him like this. But truthfully, I don’t believe that ‘he’ and you are entirely not on speaking terms, if ‘he’ is in there.”

Jack Hawksmoor grins, "Man, you sure do know how to wrap your mouth around a sentence, don't you? Maybe it's the accent, I just felt like my life had suddenly become one of those costume dramas, with all the bustles and the bonnets and the proper gentlemen in their carriages," he smiles. "Sometimes I think he's the only real one, that he's just wearing the rest of me, like a kid dressed up in a Halloween costume. And sometimes I think they killed that little boy and then just wrapped his meat around...whatever I am. Not much I can do about it either way. But it is something to think about," he says. "Your copter's on its way....you know...that Shield Helicarrier of yours has said hello to m e a time or two...I think it might actually be a city in the sky."

“I wouldn’t doubt it. For most of us that live there, it might as well be a whole little world unto itself. Sometimes I think it’s as much a metaphor as a tactical response unit.” She still seems a bit muted, watching him with studious intent. “I expect this is just about goodbye then, Mr. Jack Hawkmoor. I’m sorry if my accent is conjuring unwanted images of sherry and vicars and croquet on the lawn, since that seems not at all the way your tastes run.” She frowns momentarily before she asks, “Did I manage to make it through this whole exchange without treading into the realm of ‘unpleasantly awful twat’? And do you think we’ll meet again?”

Jack Hawksmoor laughs, "Oh, I'm certain we'll meet again. I'll have the city keep an especial eye out. Don't be surprised if you see the occasional park bench giving you a long look," he smiles, "And no, you've been anything but. Quite pleasant company, by even my meager standards. Still, I may have to give your Miss Danvers a few hundred parking tickets, just to make sure she learns a lesson. Or, at the very least, cancel her garbage pickup if she has an apartment in the city..." he smiles. He puts his hands in his pockets and walks backward to the edge of the building, "I hope we get to talk more soon, Agent Black. I look forward to finding out more of what you can read in me..." he says. And then he just goes over the edge, continually walking backwards and giving a cheery wave as he makes his way down...