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capeandcowl20202013-03-03 12:42 pm
2020mod) wrote in capeandcowl20202013-03-03 12:42 pm
Entry tags:
Open Post 002
• Step one: start a thread in this post!
• Step two: specify who the thread is for (or open) in this post!
• Step three: make people reply to this post!
• AND THAT'S THE WAY YOU DO IT.
And don't forget, there's still the ooc discussion post! And nothing needs to be contained to this post! Create new logs to your heart's content! This AU is yours, so have at it!
musebox • rules • character list
I'M FLOODED WITH IT
He was waiting on him, though.
He'd always trusted Edward implicitly. Even now, it would be so easy for him to kill this with a single blow. He couldn't lie to Edward, and he knew it. His former deputy mayor could just take down his plans with relative ease. A swift, simple word could kill this quicker than lying about his identity would.
He breathed, hands shoved in his pockets. It took him ages to reply, considering how to phrase it. He'd always trusted Edward, but he worried. He didn't sound well. He worried.
Even fucking now he worried about his old friend. There were so few people who could evoke that kind of emotion from him, but there it was.
"Because it's high time someone did something," he replied, low. He kept it soft and quiet, no need to draw attention, even to the secluded area. "You were right, we need a leader, someone to stand up," he echoed concepts from their last meeting.
SORRY FOR ALL THESE EDITS
Edward looked at Mitchell, really looked at him. His eyes pierced through whatever facade may be thrown.
"It isn't safe, to be around me," he said. "It isn't safe to be here, Mitchell, what are you thinking?" Edward kept his feet firmly on the terra firma beneath him, his hands in his pockets. His arms twitched, and he feared reacting to his former boss, his friend. He feared hurting the other man. He feared igniting ideas that were not his own. And here was Mitchell, bravely crawling out from his hole, turning his head to face the sun. Here was the man who inevitably became a leader, no matter the variables. No mater the time.
Edward cleared his throat, feeling an unknown clutching of his chest.
Mitchell had said he was right. Eddie knew he was right. And yet.
"We, ah, we have to get you somewhere safe." A beat. "Please."
I TREASURE YOUR EDITS
But the issue was that nobody else would do it, and Adrian Maskin was the perfect face for what needed to happen. He could sell the product he was slinging, but he needed the support from the imports to do it, and he didn't trust that they would understand that he truly did have their best interests at heart. But who would trust a natural citizen? Who would want someone born in this world, and trust that they weren't just trying to be different than someone else? Who could they even trust as an ally?
So he made his own, he made his fucking allies in the regular world, in reality. Like he'd done on his own before, wheeling and dealing like a master politician, and everyone knew eventually this nobody from New fucking Jersey was going to run for office someday. They knew, because he had an acumen that couldn't be denied, and despite being a man of few words, there was charisma there, a politician's born smile and a perfect handshake. Most people, it took years, but somehow Maskin already had it.
They didn't know he'd already one it, the years had already been tacked on, and the struggles had already smoothed out like the sharp crisp lines of his shirts.
"I came here because we need to talk, Edward. If anyone has connections, it's going to be you, and I need them. I need what you bring to the table."
He'd probably depended on Edward a bit too much, in City Hall, back when they'd worked together. He knew that, but he also knew what he could do, and what he brought. Always pushing his boundaries, always making him look just a bit further into the future. He'd brought perhaps not wisdom, but context to his ideas. Made it fit in a world where superheroes existed, to a man who'd been the outsider in his own world, to a man who'd led two communities.
THAT IS REASSURING
Edward didn't want to lose control.
But Mitchell Hundred was the ticker to a timebomb, he thought. Here he came, perhaps not as armed as Edward. Sure, Mitchell was still imbued with his superhuman power, but Edward had abilities beyond his own memory. He was a trained agent of the Establishment, despite not recalling half the tortured reeducation he had to endure.
The shadows, they had tongues.
Edward cleared his throat again.
"Talk about what, Mitchell? How can you come here with me --" a pause. He braced to finish the sentence. "With me unarmed? How can you risk everything?"
It was shocking, to Edward, it was unbearable. It was forgiveness.
Mitchell had forgiven him.
"You have time to run," he continued. "You could so easily escape, return to your home. How would I know your residence, now?"
It was natural to assume Mitchell had left his old hovel.
"How would I know?"
But Mitchell was a determined man, and he had already made up his mind. He was a politician crossed with a crusader; he was the man who thought he had an answer. Edward closed his eyes, willing himself to remain calm. The instinct to choke the expression from Mitchell's face haunted his neurons.
He wanted to tell Mitchell that he was endangered. He wanted to tell Mitchell that his heroics were unneeded, that he should return to safety. But the other man, this man whose name was a mask, he held solid.
"My connections are barely of any use now," said Eddie. Pushing. "Not after my -- incident."
no subject
His eyes may be brown, but there was still a touch, a hint of the intensity he'd always held, the way he watched Edward, and then everything around like he drank in the details, carefully pulling together what he saw with what he heard, painting the framework of where he was in his mind.
He'd forgiven Edward, yes. He had. How couldn't he? It was no different than what Suzanne had done to, well, most of New York City, and even now, as he watched, he wasn't in control. He could see it, plain as day, but he could also see that he was struggling for it, grasping at sand and hoping it would rain so it would clump, and he could haul it away.
He watched, but he wasn't silent. He rarely left the void empty, if he could help it.
"I'll give it to you straight, Edward," he paused, expecting a pun, a joke, something from him, before continuing. "If I go back home, I'd know if you followed, hell, the only reason we spoke last time was that I let you in. You know how my powers work, and you know that I'm not unarmed, if I don't want to be."
He made it sound more badass than it actually was. He'd never exactly been the best at fighting, but he could at least run a dumptruck into a person if at all necessary, and sometimes that was all he needed.