13164/The Reavers: Interventions, Ignorance, and Islands

The Reavers: Interventions, Ignorance, and Islands
Date of Scene:	24 October 2022
Location:	Dog Island
Synopsis:	Vorpal tries to get some information from Josh and reason with him. He finds out the Reaver rabbit hole can be just as deep as Wonderland ones, and Josh has not even started to crawl out of it.
Cast of Characters:	Terry O'Neil, Joshua Foley
Tinyplot:	Reavers

---

Terry O'Neil has posed:
~Oh it's all for me grog, me jolly, jolly grog
It's all for me rum and tobacco
I've spent all me tin with the laddies drinking gin
Oh across the stormy ocean I must wan-der~


Vorpal doesn't have a good singing voice. While it's not a caterwaul, his technique is wanting, so it is a small mercy that he is not giving a full-throated performance, but rather a very quiet mutter-song as he paces, his bare feet kicking the white sand.

It is an impossibly beautiful day, with the turquoise sea glittering under a painfully blue and bright sky, a smattering of distant white clouds on the horizon.

Dog Island is somewhere in the northwestern Florida Gulf coast, and it is less than one mile wide at its widest point and it doesn't go past the eight mile marker in length and there are no restaurants, no stores, and is mostly a wilderness preserve. Whole swaths of nesting majestic frigatebirds can be seen on the eastern part of the island- the black birds sporting an inflatable red throat pouch during the mating season. It works for female fritagebirds, but to Vorpal it just looks like the poor boys are dangling baboon butts across their chest to attract girls, which seems kind of desperate.

Focus, Terry.

The Cheshire cat looks towards where he's placed Joshua. After the young man lunged for him in the back of the car, the Cheshire proceeded to let both of them fall down a Rabbit Hole that dropped them about six hundred feet over the island. Undertandably, a young man not accustomed to that would have understandably fainted...

Or maybe Vorpal knocked him out in the middle of the scuffle and didn't notice?

-the important thing is that when Vorpal used his Rabbit Holes to slow their fall to an absolute little hop before they hit the ground, Joshua was out.

Dog Island doesn't have trees, just sparse brush, and that's it. Where Vorpal managed to get two branches tall enough to drape a cloth (where did he get the cloth?) across them so as to shield Josh from the sun and prevent sunstroke- that's a trade secret. He thought the island was a safe enough place for a heart-to-heart with the young man once he woke up. In the meantime, Terry had reached out via his team's comm to request help from Beast Boy and any other Titan available to see if they could reach the site of the explosion... and hopefully confirm Joshua's parents were alive.

"There's eighteen verses to this shanty, you know," he says as he paces, hands behind his back and feet doing a little sailor's hornpipe as he sings the shanty, "So if you're awake, I'd recommend saying so for your sanity's sake."

And he takes a mouhtful of air, and begins

~Here is me coat, me nobby knobby coat
Me coat's seen a lot of rough weather
For the sides are wore out and the back is flying about
Oh the lining's looking out for better wea--ther!~

Joshua Foley has posed:
Josh's face briefly takes on a faint golden sheen that sparkles in the sunshine before fading. The young man's blue eyes snap open and he scrambles backwards and to his feet in a panic.

"What the fuck?!"

Sand falls off the front of Josh's shirt and jeans. He looks around, bewildered, then his eyes land on Terry and they go wide.

"You! What did you?!" Josh nearly screams at Vorpal. Clearly shaken, he starts backing away.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"Well, saved us from a car accident," Voorpal says quietly, stopping in his tracks and not moving a muscle as Joshua screams. "You did jump from the driver's seat and into the back in the middle of the street. I assume that soon ater that someone rear-ended us. But I also figured you'd need somewhere to recover."

Recover from what? Well, let's not get into that.

"This is Dog Island. Don't worry, I'm not going to do anything to you." The cat moves now, slowly crouching down, arms resting on his thighs as he makes himself smaller, now that Joshua is standing up. "All I wanted was to talk."

Joshua Foley has posed:
"I'm not... I won't..." Josh looks around for help or escape.

The pristine settings offers total respite from the wider world... but nowhere to run.

"I'm not telling anything, freak! You'd better.. If you don't..."

His hands drop to his sides and feel for something that is no longer there. The hands ball into fists instead.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"I'm not a freak, first and foremost," Vorpal says, his tone even and patient, "I'm a Cheshire cat. Check that, /the/ Cheshire cat, so you probably read my book or watched my movie when you were a child," yes, because in his mind, he is the protagonist. Alice was just a very very likeable deuteragonist. "So show some respect. Secondly..."

He shrugs and tilts his head, "What is a nice boy like you doing with a bunch of anti-mutant extremists when you can shrug off being burned to a crisp and colliding into another car without so much as whiplash?"

Joshua Foley has posed:
"We're not extremists!" Josh sneers and points an accusing finger at Terry. "We're protecting normal people from freaks like you! You attacked my... If you hurt my family... We'll kill all of you, I swear to god!"

Josh keeps backing up until crystal blue water laps at his sneakers. He stops and looks behind him, then swallows hard.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"Who fired the first shot, Joshua?" Vorpal asks quietly, not moving from his crouched stance.

"Think back. Who set the explosives? Who fired the guns? I rang your door and caused no destruction. The pizza wasn't even drugged- and that's /damned/ good pizza, by the way, cost me fifty- I asked questions and came with nothing but words. My illusions broke nothing and caused no damage, all they did was deceive."

He shifts his weight a little and rests his chin on one hand.

"Your friend, on the other hand, went G. AI Jane and totaled your house. Apparently thinking your parents were an acceptable sacrifice to the cause. That? Those are the actions of an extremist."

He taps his ears, "I've requested a rescue team for your parents. If they're alive, they'll get them out and be taken to medical assistance as soon as possible. But I'm going to reiterate this," he says, tapping one finger in the sand.

"I didn't fire a single shot."

Joshua Foley has posed:
"Stay away from my parents!!" Josh yells and stalks quickly across the sand toward Terry. One of his fists turns deep black. Unnoticed by him, his hand brushes against some of the scrub. The scrub withers and dies immediately.

"Julie was defending us from you! What do you want from me?! Why can't you all just go away?!"

Terry O'Neil has posed:
Vorpal narrows his eyes as he watches the scrub wither. "It's a simple question, Joshua. Did I actually attack you?" The kid's powers seemed to extend way past regeneration. This was worrysome. Especially if he was in dep denial about them. "I will let you go right now if you look at me straight in the eye and tell me the exact moment at which I atually attacked you first, unprovoked." He slowly stands up. His height is not impressive, although his physique more than makes up for it. Even then, his stance is neutral, non-threatening as he can make it. "In fact, I am still trying to talk to you. And I will tell you what I want. There is no need to shout, there is no need to punch. All of this could have been avoided, you know. I got mixed up into all of this because a young lady was distraught over your death and asked me to find out who you were so I could tell your parents. She was awfully distraught by what had happened to you."

The cat gives Joshua a look, "Or what would have happened to anyone who wasn't a 'freak', as you put it. And for all of her troubles, you and your friend called her... what was it?" He tilts his head. "Right. 'Barrier bitch', wasn't it?"

He lets that last bit slip in there, wondering if Joshua will pick up on the indication that Vorpal, in some form of fashion, had been privy to the discussion that happened in the house- and that despite being able to be there in one way or another, he hadn't attacked. "No. Mutie shield bitch. That's it. Doesn't roll off the tongue as easily as 'barrier bitch', though."

Joshua Foley has posed:
Josh takes an involuntary step back when Vorpal stands. He swallows. The colour returns to his hand. His face is still red and screwed up with anger, but really, he's terrified. Terrified, helpless, and covering it over with anger. Josh's hands start to shake.

"You're with her?! Is that what this is? I saved her life and she left me to die! Her and those other muties! Now you're spying on me and attack my family and expect me to believe you? You're full of it."

Josh tries to hold a steady glare at Vorpal for a moment, then turns his back and starts walking away.

"Go to hell," he says. He sits down heavily in the sand with his arms wrapped around his knees and his head down.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"She didn't leave you to die, Joshua. She lierally didn't have a choice. Didn't she get physically dragged by something that could hump a trasatlantic liner and not even feel it? And once again," He raises a finger. "I didn't attack your family. Dude, I talked to your family when I delivered the pizza. If I wanted to attack them, I would have done it. And believe me... if I wanted your family and Julie gone, they would have been floating in outer space before they knew it. But I didn't. Because despite how you are trying to paint me, I am not a murdering psycho. I literally have a public reputation as /not/ being one.."

He sighs, as Joshua turns away from him. He taps his ear comm. "Bee Bee, give me an update as soon as you can, okay?" he says quietly, and then he lets his hand drop.

He watches Joshua, and then, staying where he is, he sits down on the sand as well, legs crossed under him.

"Hurting your family is literally the last thing I wanted to do."

Joshua Foley has posed:
Josh turns his head and rests it on his knees, looking away from Vorpal and out across the ocean. His eyes water. A tear rolls off his cheek onto the sand beneath him.

"Just stop," he pleads quietly.

"Leave my parents alone, they're not even Reavers. Doesn't matter what you do to me. Not like I'll die anyway. Do whatever you're gonna do," he says bitterly. "I don't even care anymore."

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"I'm not going to do anything to you, Joshua," Vorpal says quietly. His ear twitches, as if listening to chatter. He nods at something Joshua can't hear, and then his focus is back on the young man.

"You're mixed up in something deep and dangerous. With people that want to hurt people. And fighting against other people who want to hurt people. I wouldn't condone what that rhino did. But I also don't condone experimenting on people against their will, either. Two wrongs don't make a right."

He stretches his legs and buries his toes in the sand, wrapping his arms around his knees.

"How did the whole Reaver thing start?"

Joshua Foley has posed:
Josh wipes at his face with the back of one hand. He sits up a bit and looks at Vorpal with a frown.

"It's a war, people are going to get hurt. They've been getting hurt. Every time your kind has a fit and knocks a building down, mind job's someone to get their way, or spies on people and sneaks into their house, it just proves it," Josh says. "So don't give me that two wrongs bullshit. You literally kidnapped me. Cause that's totally okay."

Josh grabs a handful of sand and lets it slowly sift out of his hand. "Our pastor knows, he always talks about it. He sees it the way it is. I just met some people through church and decided to /do/ something. My parents talk a lot, but they weren't doing anything. I acted, I stepped up," Josh says, a hint of defiance and pride taking root in his voice. But then it passes and he just looks sad. "And I was so damn close."

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"Close to what?" Vorpal asks, keeping his tone casual and even, as if they were simply discussing their favorite places to eat at. "The people being experimented on. You claimed that you didn't know about that."

A mutant who fights against mutants for being mutants. He gets a vibe not unlike the time he unintentionally reconnected with one of his classmates who spoused the benefits of conversion therapy. He remembers the family pictures that were thrust at him by someone clearly trying to convince himself about the reality of praying the gay away. Glassy eyes, glass-fragile smiles that tried to paint the image of perfect connubial bliss. A picket-fenced pastel-colored Leave-it-to-Beaver hell some unfortunate children would end up being born into. He shudders slightly and shakes his head a little. Even for Wonderland, that level of delusional self-hatred was... well, absolute madness.

"So what were you close to accomplishing?"

Joshua Foley has posed:
"How long have you been spying on me?" Josh asks, his face a mix of sneer and fear. "How the hell do you know all this? She tell you?"

He runs a hand through his hair, then realizes it was still sandy. He curses softly, wipes his hand on his jeans, then uses it to shake the sand out of his hair.

"I didn't know," he says finally, quietly. "I mean. Not really. I'm not really surprised. We gotta know how to beat you, how to be better to beat you. Like the conversions. I was gonna be like Julie, like Tony got. Then some freaks blew up the shop before my turn."

Josh snorts bitterly. "Now... Yeah. Now we're waiting for the tests to come to show if I'm a freak or just lucky or just fucking cursed to burn to death and..."

Josh puts his head down again.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"Joshua. You are a mutant. And there's nothing wrong with that," Vorpal says. "Statistically, mutants and metas who engage in criminal activities is a tiny portion of the population. The majority of mutants just want to live their lives in peace. That's the case with any minority. And, you know... you might not be a fan of history, but the pattern here isn't really a good one."

"Yeah. Powers can be destructive. But you know something? A regular white-bread unstable psycho who gets into power and who has his or her finger on the button is capable of causing far more damage to the world than any one single mutant. And they and their cronies can destroy an entire economy so an entire middle class goes under, wrecking millions of lives. but the Reavers aren't concerned with fixing any of that- they're concerned with the people who werre, according to them, /born wrong/. You know, maybe... wrecking stuff isn't so much a mutant thing, or a minority thing, but... you know, a /human/ thing? Or, heck, considering what we know of other alien civilizations- and I know a few- it's a /sapient creature/ thing, and we are getting it all wrong by assuming some people are born inferior and are a threat merely because of who they are?"

"I mean. They tried out that line of thinking in Germany. Lemme tell you how hot that went... so you were working on erasing an entire population?"

Joshua Foley has posed:
Josh looks over at Vorpal incredulously and snerks. "Did you bring me here to lecture me, stalker-kidnapper cat... whatever you are? Really?"

Josh shakes his head. "Gee, I've seen the light, thanks for setting me straight. Muties are totally cool and I'm totally okay with you people victimizing normal people and doing whatever the hell you like. Totally. I feel so much better, cause it's not like people with more power than other people /ever/ took advantage of normal people" Josh says acidly.

"And hey, thanks for clearing things up for me. Since you know all about me. Probably something you saw spying on me before you broke into my house. Couldn't be magic, couldn't be a curse, couldn't be some strange tech thing, or possession, nope, I'm a freak. Glad we got that cleared up. Cool."

Josh stands up and brushes the sand off his jeans. He crosses his arms and glowers at Terry.

"Are you done with the head games? Cause it's sad, man."

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"If it were magic, I'd have smelled it on you," The Cheshire breaks into the famous grin. "Remember? Or do you really think I was being figurative when I said I was who I was?" With a single fluid motion, he rises slowly to his feet. "I spied on you for all of twenty minutes during the pizza heist. Wht I know from you, I learned from being a good reporter. Or do you think I work at the Planet as the coffee boy?"

"And yes, I do know my magic- I've rubbed elbows with Hekate. I've been put on the goddess Eris' shit list because I helped stop her releasing king Ixion from Tartarus with an army of the undead into the world."

He pauses, and then he raises an eyebrow, "You are /welcome/, by the way. And that's not counting the time I had myself strapped to some contraption so that my 'freak' mind could help overload some of Brainiac's soldiers during /his/ invasion." He counts on his fingers, "Or the time that General Zod tried to attack Earth and I helped sabotage his ship and glitter-bombed his bridge- or the time that Warworld invaded Earth and I and other 'freaks' drove a dreadnought into it to drive them away... and then I spent four months lost in an alternate dimension full of /absurd/ planets while everybody here gave me up for dead-" he points at Joshua, building up anger into his tone now "And if you think I hate you, you'd realize how much I /don't/ because I am sparing you the litany of that entire fucking journey up to and including the planet where bullshitting was a social currency. But you are /welcome/ for that, too. And at this point I am throwing in the part where I went face-to-face with goddamned Michael the fricking Archangel who tried to reboot the universe and erase all of us... and I came /this/ close to being unmade by the light of creation for my troubles. And all of that so that you could keep existing and do... this bullshit that you are doing! I've been getting my ass kicked trying to save the world from threats that /weren't/ mutants, meanwhile you and your Klu Klux Kan't are pinning all of the ills on the world on them"

He frowns, "Do you want to know what's sad, man? What's sad is one sad boy who is okay with hurting other people because he can't dude up and deal with the fact that he hates himself. For no fucking good reason."

He pauses, then, and his anger peters out quickly as he hears something. He puts his hand up to his ear and frowns. "Slower, BB, you talk too fast when you're a mouse--" a pause. And then he nods. "Ok. Help with the rescue. Make sure they're safe. Yes... look I gotta."

He stays quiet for a few moments, his breathing normalizing after releasing the anger.

"Your parents are alive. Hurt, but alive. Beast Boy located them under the rubble and is helping the rescue team."

Joshua Foley has posed:
When Terry pauses and puts his hand to his ear Josh starts in on him, voice dripping with derision. "I think you're 100% full of shit. I have no idea who you are, what planet you work from, I don't even know what you're talking about," Josh retorts, the import of any of the names clearly lost on him. "You're nuts. So don't act like you know me, you're probably off your meds..."

Josh comes to a full stop when Terry talks about his parents. His eyes narrow suspiciously. "Bullshit. This is some weird Stockholm good cop shit. My parents would /never/ want help from something named Beast Boy anyway. You're gonna lecture me but you're telling me you were like, nah, fuck the cops and firefighters and paramedics who are like pros and allowed to go rescue people, nah, you people attacked my house then decided to do your own mutie rescue? That's sick. Can you even hear yourself? You're a good kidnapper and a good hypocrite, but you make up shit stories."

Josh's face scrunches up in frustration. He bends over, grabs a rock and throws hard out over the water. Not much of an athlete, it does not go far.

"Why am I here?!" he demands, turning back to face Vorpal. "Let me go or kill me already, or whatever, I'm not playing your game anymore. Feel fucking tough using your weird shit to abduct people? Good for you. Easy to act tough when you've got freak strength and can make people disappear."

Terry O'Neil has posed:
Vorpal stares at Joshua for several seconds, his jaw hanging open. "Wh.. bu... wh... the... DAILY PLANET? One of /the/ most prestigious newspapers in the United States? Broke the news about- you know, up in the air, is it a bird, is it a plane, no it is Superman: Lois Lane wrote?" He stares again. "Do- you don't even know who I am? You don't know the TITANS?" He stares some more, rubs the back of his neck, and says, "Jesus christ kid, you really /are/ in a cult. This is some serious Unbreakable Kimmi Schmidt shit."

UUUUUNBREAKABLE- It's a miracle!
They alive, damnit!
Females are strong as hell!
Unbreakable-

Vorpal silently curses himself for summoning the eldritch earworm from the depths of the sunken city of Ratings, where it sleeps. He is going to be hearing that song in his head /all/ day long now.

He shakes his head, "Dude. Many of us have training. We help with rescue operations all the time. Wonder Woman's /sister/, who is part of our team, helps move rubble to allow rescue teams to pass through." He shakes his head.

"Abduct people? You know, the only person abducting anyone here is you, blondie. As far as the law is concerned, I have apprehended someone who has knowingly collaborated with people who abducted people and subjected them to /medical experimentation/. Are you even aware of how many years you will rot in jail for merely being an accomplice to /that/?" He crosses his arms, "Between video evidence, my uniform cam, and witness testimony? And let's not even mention the fact that the medical records and dental ID show that you were burned to a crisp- how do you think your mutant-hating buddies will react to that bit of knowledge? Sure, they can't touch you, you're practically invulnerable. But your parents aren't. And the moment you become a liability to your movement, how much do you really think Julie is going to protect your family when she risks being branded as a 'mutie lover?'

The Cheshire arches an eyebrow, "History doesn't exactly repeat itself, but it has a tendency to rhyme. Google up 'Ernst Rohm' sometime, Josh, because you are playing his part to a tee." He purses is lips, and then shakes his head, and lets out a sigh.

"But I'm not going to send you to jail. You're just a poor, sad kid who has been force-fed hateful shit and you'll believe it no matter of what reality does. And... you know, you can try to escape from reality, but you can't escape the consequences of trying to escape from reality." He tilts his head. "When someone from /Wonderland/ is warning you about being out of touch with reality... that should concern you."

He makes a gesture with a hand, and a Rabbit Hole opens. It looks onto the street where Joshua lives, the lights of the rescue vehicles, firefighters, paramedics, etc, speckle the walls of the nearby buildings. And somewhere in there, there's a green shapeshifter helping to move the last bits of debris so that the rescue teams and paramedics can evacuate Joshua's family.

"Now you may go and somehow try to rationalize me questioning you and letting you go to your very doorstep into me being a kidnapper. But..." the cat pauses, and frowns. "You may be in trouble and will need help sooner rather than later, and you may find out that your so-called friends are nothing but a pack of wolves. And you will be able to call on me, if you choose, to help you."

And then, quietly, the feline says, "You have kind eyes. It's such a shame."

Joshua Foley has posed:
Josh just rolls his eyes while Vorpal talks, standing with his arms crossed in the sand. The sun, sand, ocean, the breeze, none of it seems to register for him. His entire focus is on Vorpal.

When the rabbit hole opens Josh's posture breaks, a momentary look of panic flashes across his face. He almost takes a step toward it. He hesitates and looks at Vorpal, eyes narrowed. He takes a slow step towards the portal, then another. Josh keeps himself facing Vorpal as he does, as if expecting the other shoe to drop.

"Call you? Next time you see me, I won't be alone," Josh says in a weak attempt to sound threatening and salvage some pride or face. "We take care of our own, it's you that's gotta watch out. But don't call me for help."

Josh backs through the portal, then turns to face his home.

Several police officers are already approaching the portal. A woman in her 40's says something to another officer standing by a cruiser at the end of Josh's driveway. That officer speaks into his mic and soon Josh is kneeling with his hands on his head.

An older man with stark white hair looking out of place in an expensive suit is standing by an ambulance stopped in the middle of the road. A blonde woman, Josh's mother, is being loaded into the vehicle. The older man pats her hand and turns to look in Josh's direction.

Amid the flashing lights and people going about the scene, it is still easy enough to recognize the famed industrialist and pro-human safety advocate, Donald Pierce. He takes in the portal and Josh at a glance, then turns and walks away.