fandomtownies | Red's Tattoo: Open for Henna

Red's Tattoo: Open for Henna

(ooc: Players godded with permission)

Duce and Oz head to the shop after classes, unlocking and flipping the sign to Open. Castor and Pollux come barrelling down the stairs, eager for attention the two humans so eagerly give. Duce leaves Oz to play with the babies while she sets up her henna kit, reading a note from Red. She tilts up a sign on the counter that reads, "Red is OUT - Back tomorrow"

Once set up, she drifts back over to ~~torment~~ play with the babies again. She and Oz roll balls for their amusement, tussle with them, and can be seen occasionally down on all fours, mock growling back at the babies. Their dignity apparently didn't make it into the shop with them.

But that's ok. Babies don't need dignity. Babies need love.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Marty walks by the shop and sees Oz and Duce sitting inside. Realizing what an ass he was last night he thinks that an apology is in order.

He walks inside hesitantly and nods at Oz. He looks over at Duce.

"Hey Duce... um... I think I need to apologize for my behavior last night."

Duce's face is impassive as she regards Martin, "Really? So you're on your way to find Faith, then?"

Oz gives them both a quizzical look, not knowing what behavior Marty's talking about.

Marty nods. "She's on my list but I doubt she'll take it. I'm... just tracking down some of the people I was with last night to apologize for what I did. It was... poor judgement on my part exacerbated by personal issues. Even though you didn't get involved with... you know I felt the need to apologize."

Her voice is again impassive, "We find it strange that you think apologizing for your poor judgement excuses it. Again. If you were truly sorry for it, you'd stop the behavior that leads to it. So, consider it not accepted on our part. You want to show me you're sorry? Take some responsibility for your actions before you do them."

Duce continues, "We don't know what the hell happened to you last night, and we don't care. You took your bad mood out on Faith, and that's completely reprehensible. You'd already humiliated her to the entire school by making a video of a moment when she obviously wasn't in her right mind and selling it, advertising it. Now you pick a fight with her for no fucking reason on her part, and from the bruises, it looks like she beat the snot out of you and we can't say we're terribly sorry to see that.

What has she ever done to you to deserve your despite, Martin? Where the fuck do you get off humiliating and attacking her like this, treating her with such an obvious lack of respect, and thinking saying you're sorry will make up for it? Watching you treat her like that makes us not want to be around you, and to keep anyone and everyone else away from you too, lest you decide Faith isn't the only punching bag your pitiful ego needs."

Oz makes a hasty retreat to another corner of the store. He knows that tone of voice, and he's getting out of the way.

Marty takes a deep breath. He knew this wasn't going to be easy.

"I'm not asking to be excused for my behavior, I'm apologizing for it. As for what happened last night? I don't think I nearly got as much as I deserved for what I did. I went out looking for trouble last night. I admit that. I treated people like garbage last night as a result and Faith wasn't even the person I hurt the most."

"As for the video? It was a prank that went too far. Again poor judgement. Something Angelus and I were able to work through, though Faith and I will probably will never be BFF."

"Not all of us has your maturity Duce. I may not have been able to take responsibility for my actions beforehand, but that's something I'm trying to rectify right now."

Duce watched him, listening as he spoke and trying to gauge the sincerity. The moment grows longer, and Oz shoots a worried glance between Marty and Duce.

Eventually, she responds in a slow voice, "Faith shouldn't have been someone you hurt at all. You'd already hurt her enough. But," she sighs, "she's a big girl and can take care of herself, and wouldn't appreciate us jumping in your shit on her behalf."

A hand reaches up to rub across her face tiredly, between the stress and the nightmares, she didn't get much sleep and it's starting to show, "Don't do it again, ok? Because if you do, there will be trouble between us. We hate seeing anyone be the butt of another person's aggression. It's not fair, it's not cool, and what makes it worse is that we know you know better than to do it."

Leaning back against the counter, she adds, "For what it's worth.. we're cool. You didn't do anything to us except disappoint us, and that doesn't require an apology."

Marty sighs and nods. "I seem to be disappointing a lot of people these days. It's a habit I'm hoping to break."

Marty notices the stressed look on Duce's face. "Are you doing okay?"

As the tension in the room eases, Oz moves behind Duce, hugging her from behind. Duce smiles at him over her shoulder before answering Marty with a shake of her head.

"Worried about Paige, worried what happened to you and Faith after we left, still stressed from whatever made us psychotic last week at school, and to top it all off, the creepiest damn dreams this side of Hell." Her mouth quirks into an almost-smile, "Although the dreams fixed themeselves. The rest? Well, at least now we know you're ok, and if you're ok, Faith will be.. at least physically ok. Paige?" She sighs. "Really worried about her. She's .. too broken."

"You went psychotic last week? I thought I heard something about that. That's weird and with Paige and Ash..."

Something clicks in Marty's head.

"Do... Do you think it could be related somehow?"

Duce pauses, realization striking, "Yeah, something happened during Ab Psyche, and we had some sort of psychotic break. Paige is in that class.. and our pzychotic moment made us get .. er.. violent.."

Her face bleaches of colour, "Drusilla teaches that class."

Marty nods. "Drusilla. I think she and the Dean had a chat about that. If what's happening to Paige is a lingering after affect..."

Marty frowns.

"We need to get her some help."

[OOC: Of course Paige-mun has her own plotline to follow and I promised I wouldn't interfere other than be generally concerned]

"Believe that's what we've been saying.." Duce sighs, "Seriously, we think she needs a visit to a psychiatrist. It's not healthy, what she's doing." She frowns a bit, "Don't we have a psychiatrist at school now? Dr.. Crank or something?"

(ooc: Yeah, I know.. she wants to go be slutty without consequences, and is avoiding Duce because Duce would quite literally chain her to a wall to prevent Paige from being hurt like that.))

"I don't know. Maybe we can convince her to go to the clinic for an evaluation?"

Oz's arms tighten around her waist, and Duce wraps her arms across his in an oddly comforting gesture.

"Doubt you'll get her to," Duce shakes her head slightly, "We've seen this type of thing before. A person can't deal with .. life.. or something they've done, and they create an alternate they can blame everything on. 'It wasn't me, it was /her/' and from what we've seen, Paige has it bad. She's not going to willingly give up on that, because in doing so, she'll have to take responsibility for things she's done. She'll have to admit she did them, and live with it."

Sighing, Duce tightens her hands on Oz's arms, "The longer it goes on, the more damage she does, the harder it will be for her to ever come to terms with her personality, and the harder it will be to.. fix her."

She meets Marty's gaze, "We've seen this all before. Right now, she doesn't /want/ help. Somewhere inside, she believes she deserves to feel bad, and this.. personality.. is heaping on all the abuse she feels she needs. She needs help of the professional variety, and soon."

Marty sighs yet again.

"The scary part is I don't know it this is something that I can bring to the administration's attention or not through the security position. She's clearly in danger to herself though."

Marty shakes his head.

"I'll talk to a couple teachers and see if there's something they can do. If they can use Rover to pull in a Crazy Ash, then maybe we can find a solution for Paige."

"She needs someone to call her guardian and let them know there's a problem. Maybe.. maybe Dr. House could help." A hand runs up under her glasses, rubbing her closed eyes before retreating again, "It's getting bad enough that we're half tempted to knock her out and chain her to a wall somewhere safe. WHY doesn't our clinic, considering /this/ school, have a secure ward? We really need one."

"She's going off with strange men in bars, Martin. The school administration could at the very least confine her to the dorm. Dunno on what grounds, but Dean's a wily creature.. or, since Spider's filling in for him, maybe wouldn't need a reason at all."

I'll go to Spider and Rover and talk to them about Paige's behavior. I'll also snoop around and see if I can get information on her guardian as well.

Duce nods. ((ooc: Sorry for delay - I'm not getting notifies, and lost the thread))

"It'd be good if someone in an official capacity got involved."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Red's Tattoo: Open for Henna

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject