capeandcowl2020 | Open Post 001

One, two, three.

He was running, running fast into the woods and as far as possible. Like nothing could stop him, and in a way, nothing really could stop him. Not the authorities who'd long gave up on trying to catch up with him and certainly not the blood running down his face. Eventually he had to stop, to catch his breath and to scout his surroundings for the people after him.

Clear. Quentin checked his surroundings again. Clear- wait. There was something close by, something mechanical. It even seemed... oddly familiar. With caution, he stalked the trail of thought until he was at the door of a house. It had to be who he thought, it just had to be or else he was risking to come here for nothing. 'Honestly Quentin, it could be a trap.'

Casting doubt aside, Quentin knocked on the door softly. Knock, knock, knock. A pause, there was no sense in knocking urgently, it could scare away the person... but after a thoughtful pause he knocked again.

Knock, knock, knock.

He didn't get visitors. He didn't want visitors. It was a) difficult to write with people around, and b) a fucking bad idea, especially when there were import visitors. The few he saw, James and Zatanna came quietly, silently, and vanished the same way. Teleportation, or spy skills, either one was nearly unbeatable.

But the knock was hard to miss, and a check of the door, moving silently filled him with pause. Familiar, maybe. At least a little bit familiar. He wasn't sure who. He cracked the door, it strained at the chain, it wouldn't open any further, he didn't peek through, they couldn't see his face.

"The fuck are you?"

Relief overwhelmed him, a smile crackling through the caked blood on his face as he undid the helmet obscuring his pink hair. He'd changed throughout the years- no, he matured so the reaction from Mitchell was unsurprising. And though he was smiling, Quentin couldn't help but flinch from his injuries as he spoke in a hushed tone to Mitchell.

"It's Quentin, please help me."

Motherfucker. Shit, fucking little--

He paused, slowly sliding the chain out of the door, carefully. "Sorry, I don't know anyone named Quentin, maybe you've got me confused with--" he stopped by opening the door, still not in sight, shooing him in.

"Why the fuck are you showing up here? Do you want me to get killed?"

He slammed the door closed behind him, engaging all the locks, telling the mechanical ones to close, the left side of his face did't show the scars, but there was still a faint glow in there, indistinguishable.

He rushed in without another cue, getting a good distance from the door before falling to his knees on the ground. He was fine, alive, and by god Mitchell he was having a moment here. Breathing so hard that he was nearly hyperventilating, like he'd been suffering some kind of shock or a panic attack. In a way, he was.

"Don't worry," He wheezed, standing up slowly. "Telepath," Quentin taps his forehead lightly, as if to remind Mitchell that he'd known if anyone was around. That he wasn't born yesterday. He knew the situation was nearly the same for everyone. On the run, wanted, hated, feared. Quentin knew the situation all too well.

He turns to Mitchell, the adrenaline rushing out of his system now as he let go of his helmet with a small clatter on the floor.

"Heh, stupid... I wouldn't throw a fellow imPort to the dogs."

He breathed, stepping back, was the kid who'd given him hell when he was in office. Older, now, obviously more mature. He fingered the drawer where his gun was hidden, before he stopped.

"You're bleeding, give me a second," he mentions, heading to the bathroom, grabbing the first aid kit he kept there. He stepped quickly, tossing it at him, and then he flopped straight onto his couch. "I can't have blood in here, it might identify me as an import sympathizer if the government ever gets wind of this place. They used to search my house all the time, bugged it, too."

Because Adrian Maskin had been a normal human, he'd known. He cut off all contact, didn't use his powers, but silently shut off bugs one by one when they tried to listen in. Normal problems, power surges. Everything. He turned them off silently, and he'd gotten better with that. His range may be smaller, but he was certainly more sophisticated. He'd been able to mentally control machines under extreme duress back home, twenty years ago, almost. Shit, it really had been that long.

"If you leave blood, they'll know. They'll test it."

"Mitchell, I wasn't born yesterday, Jesus Christ," but he doesn't argue he doesn't even need to be told to clean up the blood because he was already cleaning up the small droplets of blood with the rag from the first aid kit. He holds it in the air for Mitchell to see.

"Taking this with me, you know, evidence," Quentin removes his glasses, setting them to the side gently before cleaning off his face. The gash going from his left eyebrow into the middle of his hairline. There was no more blood gushing from his face, the wound had eventually stopped bleeding on it's own but it looked nasty all the same. With a special kind of roughness, he'd taken care of his bleeding head easily.

"I promise, they won't find traces of me here. Mitch... I wouldn't do that to you," and he means it, putting any of the supplies that had gotten blood on them in that little rag, like a biohazard bag. But he wasn't done fixing himself up just yet. With a more, gentler handling of himself, he removes his jacket, sliding out of the armor and peeling off his shirt to fixate his stare on his arm which was plastered with needles and glass.

"Thank you."

He pauses, looking over at the old...well, older Quentin. He was more serious. Maybe he'd grown up. Maybe they all have. He'd lost the hope he had for the future. He fought out of necessity, because he couldn't be useless, but he couldn't hope to change things. Not anymore. The man who'd been willing to do anything to ensure the future would continue, and he was old and hitting fifty had been a miracle. He still had hoped he'd burnt out, been killed.

Not that he was suicidal, no. He eyed the kid cleaning up, still a kid, at least in comparison to his age. He started stripping down, and Mitch eyed the gash with a wince.

"Yeah, so what the fuck happened? That looks nasty."

"They had devices against telepathy," he's extremely calm as he speaks despite yanking out needle after needle and placing them carefully inside the rag. Stopping only to wipe off the trickle of new blood down his arm before pulling out the last of the needles, and then the fragment of glass.

"I saw a truck of prisoners, and stepped in to help them. They're all safe... I made sure of that before running away. Told them to run the opposite way of my direction and where they could find a safe shelter near the city so I can send them more help. Telepathically of course. I kept with them mentally to help them out so, I got a little careless physically- ngh," the glass is also set inside the rag, and he wastes no time in cleaning the wound. All that was left was bandaging it, something Quentin started to do on his own while looking up at Mitchell.

"Heh, never thought I'd see you again," a beat "I'm glad to see you again... I thought you lot were dead"

He watched, dry mouthed. Wow, this kid was...

No, okay, he was grown up now. Quentin was serious. There weren't any games, no "Mayor Fatass", no saying he eats babies, shit, he wasn't even intruding. He honest to god did sound happy to hear him.

It was different. Mitch didn't know what to do with it. Maybe in all of this trouble, in all the strife, imports came together without him. Maybe they didn't need him. Which was honestly better, anyway. He shouldn't be out there, too easy of a target. They couldn't shut him off, of course, he'd never found a way to actually shut off his powers other than weed, and nobody needed to know that one. One of his many secrets.

"Well, that was kind of the point of going undercover, you know. I was too public, my face too easily recognized, you know. I couldn't exactly write books under a pseudonym without going the whole nine yards."

He paused, and then shifted forward. "Do you need help?"

"Yeah, it's kind of hard to tie things one handedly," tenderly, he holds up his arm for Mitchell and scoots closer. Any rage against the adults attitude had seemed to diminish from Quentin, or perhaps it was the idea that all of the imPorts were now like mutants. As Quentin had warned many years ago that Mutant rights were a pressing issue. It all seemed clearer now, it was a pressing issue because it mirrored the imPorts and their current predicament. Hatred, fear, oppression and discrimination were not new to Quentin unfortunately.

"I read some of your stuff. You've got the nerve and guts keeping our cause alive, and that's good. Someone needs to write about us, for us. And not just in the kill them all babble I have to hear everyday."

With a thoughtful sigh, he takes his uninjured hand and runs it through his short pink hair. It wasn't a mohawk anymore, still pink but, kept in a more professional looking style. It reminds him briefly of the gash across his face.

"Does it look bad?"

He reached out to tie it, fingers moving quick. He'd patched himself up plenty when he'd been a superhero, he still remembered how much of a pain in the ass it was. He looked at the injury on his eye, wincing. "Yeah, it looks pretty nasty," he paused, and eyed the first aid kit. "Think you can handle stitches? I'm not as good as Kremlin was," really was, shit, he'd spent years not thinking about him, "but I think I could seal that up for you."

It was something of a gesture. Quentin had grown up, he'd gotten older. They were both wanted, well, Quentin more so than him. He was "dead".

"Here, hand me the needle and thread out of there. We need to get you sealed up. This is going to hurt like a bitch."

"If you think you can handle stitching it, if not I'll hold through until I reach my next checkpoint," but that could be another two days before he reached it. And by then, the wound would surely start to heal in a disfigured kind of way. Quentin reluctantly hands over the needle and thread to Mitchell. Not that he didn't trust Mitchell, but to brace himself. He smiles, dabbing again at the gash with a clean bandage to soak up the blood welling up in the lines of the gash.

"You act like I've never been hurt, Mitch."

"Hey, if I'm here, I can at least help, you know?" he took the needle and thread, and quickly threaded it. Okay, so he could sew. It wasn't like it meant anything. He'd had to build his superhero costume somehow, after all.

He reached out, and pressed the needle in, starting to sew it shut, pausing after the first slice in. He remembered Kremlin stitching up his arm. It always hurt. "Keep talking, what are you getting up to? I've stayed out of the loop with import affairs, for the obvious reason."

"Sonovabitch," but he kept still. No lashing out or screams of bloody murder. Instead he tensed up and become absolutely still. Only moving when Mitchell wasn't piercing his skin.

"Keeping lines of communication open. I'm the guy who's keeping in touch with the various resistance forces, you know? Trying to unify everyone," Quentin seems to stare hard at Mitchell, anything extra to keep his mind off the pain. "And finding those who've gone underground, establishing connections with them. Anything to bring our community. But that's the biggest bulk of my work." He continues to stare, blinking whenever the needle came close to his face.

"I'm also a terrorist, as you know. Though I expect that that's not new news, is it Mitch?"

He tried to keep his hands steady, but still made it quick. Home remedies kept you out of hospitals, and that included his own stitches if necessary. He hadn't gotten surgery on the rest of his body, the tell-tale scars were still there, and deepening with age, spreading. He knew they would. It was a disease, in a way.

Not important. He slid through the skin, feeling sick every time, but it would at least hold it for the guy for now. "Wow, I never would have thought it. At least there's some part of you still the same. Still, I'm kind of surprised my trees out there aren't covered in toilet paper."

There was a tone of amusement, a bit of wryness. Quentin had never hurt things, but...the kid had been relentless. He'd seen things about Mitchell that he shouldn't have. That he'd never wanted anyone to see. He'd kept everyone from seeing, or even knowing. He didn't even think Pherson had brushed so close to their creators, but he couldn't be certain.

"How is it working? The unification, I mean?" he broke himself from his thoughts. "It makes a bigger target, you know."

"I didn't know you lived here. Pure chance that I would come across your house," he grins, amused that Mitchell thought of him like that, before flinching again. It was clear that he was in a lot of pain but, he didn't complain, tried not to make a peep if he could help it. It wouldn't do to freak out the guy patching him back together. Quentin sucks in some breath, before explaining his intentions.

"I know, that's why the groups are still separate. You can't trust the wires, and not everyone has a teleporter in their group. Basically I make sure there's no mis-communications. Face it, it would suck if our own kind died by friendly fire." He shifts a little in his seat, there was only so much pain a guy could take before he's uncomfortable.

"Mostly I focus on my own acts of terrorism, it's just important to make sure everyone is at least on the same terms. No good if we don't all work together."

"No, it dosn't," he paused, tugging closed the last patch of skin, making a knot, and reaching for scissors to finish it off. That was going to hurt like a bitch. "I hope you have healers wherever you're going. That might get infected. At least it won't be spilling blood on your way out."

He stood, stretching from the motion, back into his living room, small as it was. It was a change from Gracie Mansion. "Do you think terrorism will actually do something, though? It's just going to make them more scared of us. It proves their point."

"Thanks Mitchell, I'll be sure to get it checked out," carefully, he touches the stitches. Tenderly enough to admire the temporary work. It would probably get infected, with or without healers anyways but Quentin didn't tell Mitchell that. Instead, he smiles and makes work of putting back on his armor slowly as to not mess too much with his wounded arm. He also carefully places the bloodied tools, anything that can be thrown out, inside his pocket.

"No. They call it terrorism but, it's more of obtaining documents and weaseling out information from officials. Do you want to know why a lot of prison breaks go successfully as they do?"

He laughed, lifting an eyebrow at the guy. "Well, at least there's a point in there. Remember when you used to go out of your way to annoy the shit out of me?" he asked. His voice was light, he was trying not to worry about the resistance. He couldn't. He had to truck on, and go his own way on this, and that was what Mitchell did. He needed to be the inside voice that thought with logic instead of listening to government propaganda.

"Yeah. You hated my guts, I'm sure of it. Heh... what? Do you miss that Mitchell?" He couldn't help but tease Mitchell. The guy sounded like he could use some lightening of the mood. Everyone could use some happier news in their lives in these pressing times.

"Don't worry about us, we need you where you're at Mitchell. Someone's gotta make sense of things."

"Hate's such a strong word--" he started, but stopped, shaking his head.

"I know. Believe me, I wouldn't do you guys much good out on the front lines," he paused, a faint and fond smile on his face. "Did you know I jetpacked into a chain link fence once? I'm not exactly made for battle, you know."

He even laughed, Jesus, he was an idiot.

Quentin had to laugh, clasping a hand on Mitchell's shoulder. Wow, why haven't they gotten along previously? Oh. Right. Quentin was the biggest asshole in existence.

"Heh, well my first time on a jetpack I had a telepathic seizure. Kind of embarrassing to be the kid that has to be saved by the janitor and his tongue." He smiles again, shaking his head. "Jetpacks aside, you're strong for us where you're at now but... that doesn't mean you're not strong Mitch. Don't beat yourself up over it too hard," a beat.

"I can tell you're worried."

That was it, it had all been Quentin, and none of it had been Mitchell being, in general, a dick. He knew he was a dick, anyway. He'd always had a small streak of it.

"Hey now, let's not get into the speeches, huh? Don't worry about me. I just need to lie low, and keep my head down, and work on a new book. You don't worry about me, okay? I'm the propaganda guy," he paused, and frowned. "Just... don't tell anyone you saw me, alright? I figured you knew, but--" he shook his head, and waved a hand.

"Mitchell, I know you can handle yourself. You're a grown ass man. And I also know better than to tell anyone, hell, I'll probably mind wipe myself so the information doesn't leak, okay?" He meant it too. For the safety of Mitchell it's something Quentin would do to protect the other's identity and location.

"Besides, if you couldn't survive, well, you'd have been dead since day one."

Open Post 001

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