Summary:Mera meets Harley and receives bad life advice. Log Info:Storyteller: None |
Related LogsTheme SongNone |
  |
A humid, cloudy Friday evening in the Disaster Zone. While the City That Never Sleeps prepares for a weekend of fun, this part of the city is more the grumpy stay-at-home. No one should actually be in here but plenty are. The lost, the criminals, the hiding, all flock to this ruined area.
Mera has also been spending a lot of time here, using it as a base for her trips into the city proper. Still dressed in her 'human' clothes of boots, white pants, white blouse, long beige coat, she has found a pile of rubble to sit on and watch the world go by.
One of the perks of this new Thunderbolts gig? Harley gets to go outside. That's great news for Harley Quinn, professional crime clown, and maybe less than great news for the rest of humanity. As a point in the rest of humanity's favor, Harley is at least on a leash, and only out for missions.
Not that it's hard to miss Harley, because apparently she's not been tasked with being especially discreet. Does it matter, in the Disaster Zone? Climbing through the wreckage to get a good vantage point, Harley is unmistakably dressed up as herself, in all of her pale, blonde, tattooed, down-with-the-clown glory. "Yodelay, yodelay, YODELAY-HEE-HOOO~!" she sings from the top of a garbage pile, like a wolf howling at the moon. That she's right above Mera doesn't seem to enter much into her decision. Probably?
Mera is startled by the terrible attempt at whalesong, turning her head to check out the brightness against the dark of the neighborhood. "Though I think you sang the right notes, I do not think you sang them in the right order" she points out politely. "If you are looking for Mister Joker, I have not seen him in some time. If you are trying to attract whales, you may wish to get a bit closer to the ocean." Mera can be helpful too.
Harley stays atop the rubble-pile, bending forward to look down at Mera. The way she's leaning, a far more normal person would probably topple over, but she keeps her balance in a way that's almost eerie and/or straight out of the 'Smooth Criminal' video. The mention of the Joker makes her look outright puzzled, her lips quirking into a confused frown, before her trademark manic grin settles back in. "Hey! I'm chasin' somethin' all right, but it ain't chubbies, so maybe don't project your own whaley desires onto others, lady," she says as she leaps down from the pile and lands in front of Mera.
"Whaley desires?" That has Mera confused far more than strange leaning. At least she no longer has to strain her neck when the blonde lands in front of her. "I have no whaley desires that I am aware of. What is it your are chasing? Are you a friend of Sunny's? Another blonde girl who was here searching for a barely clad woman that had caused a commotion." A wave of her hand at the devastation around them. "Not many people come here without a reason."
"Nah, I was more a purple stuff kid," Harley replies to the question of whether she knows Sunny. She doesn't seem to mind that Mera has no idea what the Clown Princess of Crime is talking about — it's not like anyone else ever does. "Oh, just the usual, y'know, any unexploded munitions that haven't already been stolen out from all the crap here. It's a good gig, if you aren't scared'a land mines. Problem is, you can only do it once!"
"Depends how tough you are I suppose" Mera smirks about the landmines. She's had contact with plenty of mines in the sea. Sometimes, too close of a contact. "Mister Joker was handing out guns to the residents the other day, perhaps you should get in touch with him?" Her brow furrows. "Is this not where people lived before whatever it is that happened, happened? Why would there be munitions where people lived?" A sigh of revelation. "Ah…the people here liked to kill each other."
The mention of the Joker again causes Harley to pause and regard Mera suspiciously. Like before, the moment passes, and what's weird about it is that Harley DOESN'T comment. "Everyone everywhere likes killin' each other, lady," Harley points out as she walks on her heels in a loose circle, capering around for an audience of one. "It's kinda the story of the world…!"
"Not the story of the entire world" Mera points out with an amused smile. "I do not enjoy killing anything." And since she is more important than most, that counts for something. She will follow the circling Harley as best she can - the tattooed woman does seem like someone it would be safer to keep an eye on at all times. "My name is Mera."
"I'm Harley," the clown responds, looking back over her shoulder at Mera, and then spinning on a heel to face her in a move that looks equal parts unplanned and well-practiced. "Pleased t' meetcha. So you just live out here, or what? Are you one'a those cool wasteland dwellin' cannibals like they always usedta have in movies? I love those guys!"
"Harley is a nice name. I have heard some quite unusual names while I have been here. I even met someone called Sarah the other day. No, I do not live here" That last part revealing obvious distaste in Mera's tone at the very idea. "Wasteland cannibals? Umm…no…I am not one of those. Ah…I have heard of these movies. I have even seen some. They mostly involve cats."
"Nah, the only one where they eat a cat that I ever seen is the one about the freak in the castle," Harley points out. She pauses to look Mera up and down, like she's expecting something from her, and then lets the moment go. "So there's this freak, right? And he's in this castle, he eats a cat and like, bites a prostitute's boob off or whatever, an' then he just rips his own ding-dong right off. Like, it's there, an' then… gone! Ripped off! Anyway, it had a big effect on me as a kid…"
"I am not surprised that it would affect you" Mera deadpans in reply. It doesn't seem a movie she knows. "I will assume that his ding-dong is what is between a man's legs." A pause. "If you look hard enough. Why did he rip it off? And why bite a breast off?" She may regret asking such questions. "The movies I have seen are very short and involve cats misjudging their leaps, or playing piano. So many of them seem to be about the same thing. I certainly did not see anything like what you described."
"Why does anyone do anything?" Harley shrugs. She doesn't seem particularly concerned with the rationale behind dismemberment, of one's own self or otherwise. She just accepts it as it comes. She does answer her own question, though, after a beat: "Because it's there, and because ya can!"
"I guess that is a reason to do something" Mera shrugs, though she doesn't sound very convinced. It's all a bit too anarchy for her. Societies need structure…especially when you're near the top of that structure like Mera is. "Though the reasons that people do things are usually to obtain a benefit, or pleasure, or power. Ripping off your own ding-dong does not lend itself to any of those things. Though I am not a man, so perhaps I do not understand something. Highly unlikely, since they are so easy to understand. If you do run into some of these cannibals, Harley, how will you protect yourself?"
Harley thinks about Mera's question for a long moment. In fact, she really makes it clear how hard she's thinking about it, by putting on a cartoonishly over-the-top 'I'm thinking very hard' expression and cupping her chin in her hand and scratching her temple and everything, all of it. "Well, if ya can't beat 'em, join 'em," she finally says, and then erupts in laughter.
There is nothing inherently wrong with Harley's solution, it's more the way she says it (and those expressions and actions while she gets there). A confused look on Mera's face at the laughter before she snorts in amusement herself. "I would prefer beating them, but you will probably survive that way. Unless they eat each other. They are cannibals after all. You are an interesting person, Harley. I like you. I do not suppose you know about the giant sea creatures that attacked the city a couple of months back?"
Harley blinks at the talk of the giant sea creatures. "Oh, you mean the Met Gala? Sweetie, they do that every year, they just did one, like, this week. I mean I know some'a the styles are kinda outre by yours an' my standards," says the woman dressed like a clown, "but it's just rich people dressin' up weird and plannin' out who's gonna have the biggest bunkers to keep the rabble out after the whole climate apocalypse thing, ya know?"
"The Met Gala?" Mera has not heard this theory yet but it is obviously worth investigating on the word of a clown. "Rich people were the giant sea creatures? How? Are they mutants?" This is quite troubling news. "Do you know where these rich people live? Do you have names? Where are their bunkers?" This is the best lead she's had yet!
Harley rubs her chin. "Tell ya what. I gotta get movin' — I'm on the clock, an' all, an' my bosses get kinda cranky if I spend too long dawdlin', takin' candy from strangers, all the good stuff." She steps closer to Mera, and leans in: "But I hear all the richest sea monsters are spendin' a lotta time in the Hamptons over the next couple months." She winks, and then leans back, and begins to saunter off on her merry way. "Good meetin' ya, Mera! Have a good time — all the time!"
"Nice to meet you too!" Mera calls out after the bouncing blonde. It seems she will have to take a trip to these Hamptons and find out the truth. "You have been most helpful. I hope you find some landmines." Harley has a 'boss'? That poor person.