Summary:Luke and Anya share the cliffs notes of their origin stories. Log Info:Storyteller: None |
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"I wouldn't put that one in a jar."
There is a touch of humor in Anya's eye as she passes Luke and walks into the back room, and it doesn't take long for her eyes to fall on that weight set. "Jesus," she whispers with surprise, and walks over to inspect it. "Did you have to reinforce the basement to keep this thing from cracking the floor?"
Following Anya into the back room, Luke lets the door close behind him. "Yes, and that is just a warmup set." says Luke matter-of-factly.
He walks over to the weight bench and sits down on it, "Look, I'll be straight with you. Truth is, I only did open your backpack enough to see the underwear. I didn't see all the other clothes. Until a minute ago I just thought they might have been backups in case of…you know…leakage or something." He shrugs a shoulder, his skin turning a bit darker. He clears his throat before he continues, "Anyway, so..I wasn't trying to bullshit you out there. But yeah, now one and one make two." He shrugs again, "As for me, you're not wrong. Guns, knives, knuckles…none of them scare me, you can see why." Luke gestures to the flattened slug in her hand.
A dubious look is given at that remark about a warm up set, but at the remark about leakage, Anya just stares at him. He's not wrong! Any woman past that whole coming of age thing who has a shred of wit about her carries something to prevent… that.
"I know," she says. "I mean, I believe you. And I damn near came close to walking out that door letting you be all daft about it." She turns to lean against something that doesn't look as if it'll break, and sighs. "But eventually? You'd put it together. Tonight, tomorrow, next week, or once you realized the area I usually… work. Patrol." She waves a hand, still feeling as if all this vigilante jargon is weird to say. "Whatever."
Opening her hand, she studies the slug again before tossing it back to Luke. "Look, we're practically neighbors. I dunno if you go putting on masks and roughing up jackasses like I do, but, sooner or later, if you aren't caught up in it, you will be." She says this as if she knows, deeply, from experience, that this is true. "I gotta know who the good ones are, just like you do."
As if to put her mind at ease about the warm up set (and also to break the stare down he is getting), Luke casually with one hand moves one of the heaviest looking object there without much effort to clear a space for Anya to sit if she wants. He catches the slug with ease and kneads it between his thumb and finger like one would knead a small wad of putty. "Probably. I may look the part of a big dumb jock, but I'm a little smarter than people tend to give me credit for. You don't have to worry, I'm not gonna say anything."
He glances back at her and shakes his head, "No masks. I tend to just keep to myself, unless someone comes looking for trouble, but I am on the side of the angels. Just like you."
"Hey, I never said that," Anya retorts, and there's a lack of sass or fire in her tone. "You don't open and run a place like this if you're some dumb brute." She looks around at everything, noting how everything is organized, has its place. It's a bit overwhelming to her, considering it all. She's at home with computers, electronics. The logistics of all this would give her a headache if she thought about it long enough.
"Angels get to see some ugly things," she tells him. "Sometimes, they have to do ugly things, because it's right. And they scare the hell out of people."
The way she talks, it almost sounds as if she's seen some of these ugly things. She's had the experience. Anyone who's seen the ugly side of humanity - the really ugly side, not the part that is peddled by Hollywood - would recognize that tone.
"Shit sister, if you knew even half the things I have seen.." Luke says with a sigh. "Let's just say that I have been in the pit of Hell, bathed in its waters, and due to the grace of God I was able to rise from it all."
He flicks the remains of the bullet from his finger, and the fragments embed themselves in one of the crates. "We all have our stories, don't we? They never seem to be good ones either. Mine started here in Harlem, it is only fitting that it will end here to, but it is what we do along the way that makes us who we are. I intend to leave Harlem a better place than when I came to it."
"Guess we're God's answer to all the shit people have done to the world," Anya wonders aloud. "I tried to walk away from it, you know," she admits. "I was just Anya. Working toward that BA. Thinking about masters programs, internships, jobs, moving out." She eyeballs the flecks of remaining bullet shards, then looks back to Luke. "Ignoring the sirens was hard enough. Then some shit went down in Central Park, and there was no way I could avoid it. Not anymore."
Rising, she walks over to Luke and, if she lets him, will put a hand on his shoulder. "It's our curse for being gifted, hombre."
Turning away, she collects her backpack. "You got a family though, right? People who care about you?" She lifts an eyebrow, suspecting that there are at least some folks he can call family. "If you care about their safety… get a mask."
Luke Cage doesn't flinch away from the hand on his shoulder, and he shakes his head. "It's just me. I've got nothing to hide for." He reaches up and scratches at the back of his neck, "Besides, I'm just not that guy. If I am going to face something, I'm gonna face it head on."
He looks up at Anya, "Maybe, but this was done to me. A little 'experiment' gone wrong…or right I guess? Certainly backfired on the guy that thought cranking up the juice to eleven would finish me off. Joke was on him." He smirks, "No loss. One less racist prison guard to worry about, right?"
"You got this place," Anya counters, gesturing about with her eyes. "Worth protecting if you ask me." Then again, she doesn't know what it's like to be… well, unbreakable.
A snorting laugh is given at mention of the now deceased prison guard. "Gonna have to tear down the whole system and rebuild it someday," she points out, but she can certainly appreciate the sense of justice his story entails. "As for me… magic rocks." Her expression suggests that she absolutely isn't jerking his chain, either. "Don't fuck around in the disaster zone, you never know what you might find."
Chuckling, Luke retorts "This place is just a place. It can always be rebuilt. Hell, that is why I spend so much in insurance!"
"You'e probably right. I sort of started with Blackgate." He pauses, as if weighing something in his mind for a moment before committing to it, "Long story short, I used to be a punk ass kid here on the street, then I mended my ways and became a cop. My best friend didn't, and we had a falling out. He stashed a bunch of heroin in my pad and next thing I knew I was in Blackgate, doing hard time. Part of that hard time was being forced to fight as a gladiator for the amusement of the guards. One thing led to another, I ended up in a tank of chemicals with an electric current running though it and the Bossman tried to finish me off by cranking the juice. Machine exploded, he died, I became virtually unbreakable and bailed. I got the better end of that deal. That is Luke Cage, the Cliff Notes. So. now we are even. I have your secret, you have mine. I'm a fugitive."
Anya listens to the tale; none of it seems to surprise her or shock her until he gets to the part about chemicals and electricity. She's only 21, but you learn a lot growing up in a rough neighborhood. There's a slight grimace at that particular part of the story, but her scientist's mind is already racing, trying to figure out just how electricity and chemicals could cause… that. She's not too good with human biology, after all.
"At least you aren't a cop anymore," she says. She doesn't hate them, but she certainly doesn't trust them. The part about being a fugitive? Doesn't really bother her. Vigilantism isn't exactly legal, after all.
"Blackgate's a shit hole, anyway." She's been there, on the visitor's side of things, but doesn't explain why. "You're better out than in. If you need anything…" She pauses there, then stresses again, "anything… I got your back."
Reaching down, Anya scoops up her backpack and slings it over a shoulder, making to leave. However, when she gets to the door, she pauses halfway through opening it. "Curves, though?" The mischief is back, and her lips curl just a bit. "I hope that isn't why he landed that punch."
The young woman slips out into the bar, leaving a $20 on the bar as she heads for the door.
"Hey, I'm human!" Luke shouts after her as she heads out the door, sneaking a glance at the curves in question. "I would never have said that to you if I knew it WAS you!" he lies.
Grinning, Luke stands up and makes his way back out to the front to open up for the night crowd, pocketing the $20 and taking the bills to the till.