7220/1000 Faces: Put a Fork In It.

1000 Faces: Put a Fork In It.
Date of Scene:	04 August 2021
Location:	House of Mystery
Synopsis:	John returns from India to find a fiery fae waiting none too patiently. What is that horrible SMELL?
Cast of Characters:	John Constantine, Meggan Puceanu

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John Constantine has posed:
    If Meggan had any mind to pay attention to that little gifted rock, the thing went through a gambit of colors in the past twenty-four. At one point the thing was even such a dark garnet red it was near inextinguishable from the dreaded black. Even now, it's somewhere between blue and red; a purplish mix really.

    ...and she's like to feel the reason the moment the portal to bring John home again snaps open. How could she *not* feel it? It *hurts*. Everything hurts, absolutely nothing has been spared the pain of it, not even John's blackened soul. The pain isn't emotional though, not even the searing in his soul, it's all physical, it's the lingering remains of a source too Holy for the likes of him swirling around in demon tainted blood. It's like a pot of boiling water really, cooled enough to not cook outright, but not enough to not scold.

    The center of it is his chest, it radiates outward from there.

    But when he steps through, in whatever room Meg's take up in because the House knows what John needs, the immediate evidence of injury are the purple bruises, deep and crushing, around his throat.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
Colours skewing from white to red and roundabout leave a very fraught fae trying to summarise why having Siberia on fire impacts businesses in the Northeast. It's not a very good time. She normally would study with a plethora of distractions around; earbuds in, modest laptop open, music playing and a stream of conversations scrawling through social media. She might get a few paragraphs written before dancing into Twitter, Insta, and other avenue, normally.

That damn rock proves a horrible distraction. Instead she paces around with a cup of tea, her hair essentially on fire, tiny sparks and swirls of living flame convulsing it. Not entirely out of the ordinary to shift forms, but in this case, truly it is. A destroyed candle, a blackened piece of toast, and a lot of steam attest to efforts to not start frantically doing nothing.

Doing nothing is the hardest thing of all. So, the smoking hot girl -- flames, people -- floats in the middle of the safest place one can be, probably somewhere tiled, with the sooty ruins of a few papers at her feet. The phone isn't dead or melted, but that really is a near thing. She scowls at the rock. The rock doesn't scowl back. How many hours of maddened deviations? "Merlyn's balls, I will chain you to the bloody Stone of Scone--"

A worried, upset Meggan is not exactly off the course for Constantine, surely. Finding her literally having forgotten what flesh is, well, there you go. She's a person-shaped fire, golden and orange, lava with a side of bonfire. "Maybe a henge. You can't drag around a henge, I know that." Crackling sibilance makes talking as a fire quite exciting, dunnit?

John Constantine has posed:
    This is where, normally, John would enter the room through that portal, all swagger and arrogance and blowing it all off as nothing, 'Bloody Hell, woman, put the fire out, no need for it, I'm fine'.

    It goes a little different this time around, a difference that may well catch his smoking hot - flames, people - faeling off guard completely. Maybe it'll be enough to stifle the flames, or maybe it'll just turn them to a pyre?

    "It hurts, love." Just that, so simple those three words, yet they leave him so vulnerable. Once he's laid it out there, John strips off that old coat of his, wincing in the process - really it *hurts*, and tosses it to kitchen table; safest place for a flaming fae other than the tiny, cramped bathroom.

    He loosens his tie and tugs that off as well, it leaves his collar to fall open to reveal the extent of those bruises.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
Blow through all arrogance and smarts, that may work well. But reason and rationality are out the window; empath is as empath does, which is resort heavily to instinct or intuitive reactions. If John likes, he could deal with an anxious red panda or a cat on the ceiling.

This form at least lets him light a cigarette, no problems or issues, except possibly ashing the entire box by proximity. Bonfires at dusk, floating salamander-girl at dawn, the hazards to one's precious smokes are many. Heat shimmers, not glowing white, but mostly torch-bright and fairly unhappy as John strips down the layers and she makes a crackling sigh that sounds like a twig just bit the dust.

"I don't know how to help." His soul-rock is set down, like the happy pet rock it is, where it won't be burned by any problematic changes in state. The tea is there in volume. "What in the everliving night did you do to yourself?"

She doesn't quite reach out a hand to help. Well, she does, but stops about three times in the moment to not just set him on actual fire. The House might be a bit pissed about that. So might he.

John Constantine has posed:
    Last first, "I needed power and I took it." Vague but enough for the likes of her to figure it out maybe? She's been around him enough to know there's really only one source of power that could leave him in this state after channeling it.

    John steps back until his backside is right up against the counter, something to help hold him upright a little.

    "Take a breath, love, douse those flames maybe?" Trembling hands work at the buttons of his shirt. Really John? Now? One might think that's where he's heading with the removal of clothing, given, you know, that it's *John*.

    ...last button, he shrugs out of that white button down and then pulls off the white t-shirt he always wears under the things.

    Funny thing how mystical 'forkings' spare the clothing but damn what they can do to the flesh. But there it is now, all laid bare and vulnerable, just as Meg's managed to do to him. No swagger, no arrogance, just a hoarse, "...and help me put something on these?" The burns that is, where the three tines of Mystical pissy-ness seared right through him.

    Laid bare and squishy or not, he still doesn't say the rest of it, what might help if only to provide a little emotional comfort, but the desire's there beneath the surface of the pain of it all; and maybe give me a bloody hug, woman.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
"You took it." That's a bleak statement of what led to the demise of a temple, but hey, that's cool. Meggan doesn't exactly know about the temple bit. Newshound she may be, usually in the direction of 'Siberia is on fire' or 'palm oil plantation destroys ancient rainforest.'

Poison Ivy is right, even if she's really a bit extreme about her ways.

Cooling down isn't easy. "I don't know if I can." The words lie between them, not flung so much as smoldering and running out of oxygen or fuel. One of the two. "Not yet. I want to." The rising pitch scales up the brightening shade, no longer reddish but golden-bright. Not entirely out of keeping, but the best she can do is float close to the table in mostly arm's reach, wincing at the categorically scary burns already bubbled and jabbed through flesh. In one side, out the other.

Fiery fingers over her lips show a mercy the real flames bouncing around the world never do. They tell a story that she doesn't know how to suppress. "But it's all so... so... what did that? John, youhavetotellmewhatdidthathowdidyouendupsobloodybatteredabout? Loveno--I'msosorryitmusthurtdoestheHousehaveburncream? I'm not certain thatitwouldbemuchhelpatleastwecouldtryyoureckon?"

Yeah, fire. At a mile a bloody minute, accelerated to a staggered pitch. The ancients weren't dumb, they knew certain qualities apply wherein the fire-born are involved. Hot headed, for one. She drags in a deep, long breath. "But you're home and that's-all-that-really-mattersintheend. Home. Safe. Home."

He wants the hug, but he probably doesn't want the third degree burns that come with it.

John Constantine has posed:
    It's worked before, so John falls back on it. In his mind's eye, in his *heart* he pictures what he needs Meggan to be right now; just Meggan, with her touch that can be so soft and gentle, with her long flowing blond hair that he loves the scent of... just Meggan.

    ...and even through it, he's turning to reach up for the highest cabinet over the sink. The motion, raising his arm, it stretches skin around those burns and lights fire anew to them. "I was thinkin' this," he rasps out through a ragged breath. He's holding a mason jar, simple thing. John is not a healer, not even on his best days, but he does know how to whip up potions and magical concoctions ahead of time.

    He twists off the lid. Damn, but that stuff *stinks*; like someone added eucalyptus to a baby's dirty nappy and sat it to bake in the sun for a day.

    Meggan, his soft, sweet, bubbly, flesh and bone, Meggan... Meggan, Meg, his love that's consumed him so completely, the woman that owns his heart now, Meggan ~ the sole focus of his desires pressed outward.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
Hours of not knowing, days of not knowing, have left their toll. Impressionable minds can suck up new thoguhts and visions like a sponge, but they require some fairly heavy focus from a man beaten half to death, sludged, and attacked by gods only know what. It asks a lot of him to achieve. Of her, there is simply the liquidity of flame and form.

She remembers what humans look like, but not being one. Bit messy on that front, though her hair still smokes and wisps with dancing golden flame. Right colour, right shape, still prone to accidentally burning down random shacks or cornfields.

"Whatisthatabsolutelyatrociousthing? Pop over to the pond and upsetafewducks, havewe?" Humour. Really, an attempt at it while he is so desperate to use fowl concoctions invented by dropbears to scare tourists straight to patch himself up. Can fire smell?

It was better when she couldn't. Meggan makes such a face that she might well be sick, hitting her feet to the tiles that warp and hiss at the heat of bare flesh. Aaaaand time to run to the bathroom immediately.

But there aren't pools of broken tile or small smoldering wrecks either so something must be worth it, but she will get back to the comfort after a mildly alien mindset is *human*ish again with all that entails. Like utter nausea.

It worked, but that's not without cost for John. Like the source of said comfort being repelled by a jar of koala chlamydia.

John Constantine has posed:
    And so it goes that John is left alone in the kitchen, he hasn't it in him to go chasing after. He looks down at the jar, nose wrinkled, yes he can smell the stuff, yes it's *gross*, but it'll damned well do what it needs to and that's take away some of the pain he's barely managing to stay on his feet through.

    With a little sigh of a breath, he dips some of that nasty stuff - it's even green, like snot green - out with the fingers of one hand and starts the process of coating the burns on his chest in the stuff. Like any healing anything worth its salt, the initial sting of it damned near brings tears to his eyes, almost takes him to his knees and definitely has him hissing a ragged breath of 'fuck me sideways, but that hurts'.

    ...then it settles to do its job, not healing really, more just making it not hurt quite so much; starting at the source and radiating out, scalding water turns to something more akin to 'the bath's a little too hot'.

    Getting the back, the exits of the tines, that'll be a challenge.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
No, she doesn't like that smell. Water runs through the pipes, squeaking and loudly rattling. Dousing her face by splashing handfuls over her skin does not help Meggan. Maybe if she breathes through her mouth?

Even through a closed door, the smell pervades the washroom and she sinks down to rest against the wall with a miserable sound of despair. Someone deserves to be shot. This formulation could be used to level an elephant or drown a whale. Sadly the Mariana Trench is out of range. The nearest deep is the Hatteras Abyss, isn't it? Maybe she can go crawl into that sunken US sub out there.

"Are you done wallowing in the dump?" she calls out, sympathetic but horrified. Because frankly that smell is repulsive. Even if her body adjusts eventually to cut off any signs of breathing, or smelling at least. Being anosmic just happens.

John may want to forgive her. Maybe not. She comes out with a towel, anyway, to help. Poking her head out of the bathroom, she walks carefully, her hair starting to curl gold and sparks of flame showing again. But not imminently setting fires! "Is it going to get messed up if it's on me?" She holds out her arms, towel and all.

John Constantine has posed:
    By the time Meggan makes it back out, John's kind of figured it out on his own. Man has his own towel, the type used to dry dishes. He's coated the nasty stuff onto the towel and is in the process of using it 'dry your ass' style to rub across those burns on his back.

    ...and he's looking about as green as the goop he's using to ease some of the pain. Towel isn't the softest and the rubbing of it against those burns isn't the best feeling.

    "I got it, love," he grits out between teeth and jaw clenched. It causes the muscle there on the right side of his jaw to twitch.

    "I'm fine..." Damnit. "I need to go to the library, try'n find something..." Anything that might explain what's been happening. ...when he should damned well be in bed.

    Forgiven? Nothing to forgive. But it seems the moment of vulnerability's passed, maybe?

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
Is it too late? It may very well be but in they're vulnerability are they both so inherently wounded, or at risk for the trauma that someone can inflict with the wrong word or look.

"Probably not for the best to go to a library looking like that," Meggan murmurs. She brings the towel along, and gingerly applies it to John's back. The rather bubbled, dubious appearance of skin isn't improved by the mucus membrane he happens to be spreading over himself in a lens of tacky goop.

It's like slime kids play with, except the slime brings a sound of bubbling and hissing in different ways, since this isn't white glue-based, is it? He can shy away or swat her off, but otherwise this is a two-person affair to mend the damage. "Act like we've no way to use a computer around here, or ask someone to go for you. Have a second pair of hands, haven't you?"

Or six! But the positive matter will stay put. "Put your hands down, you are only pulling all the muscles in your chest to reach back here, and how that doesn't split you in half..."

A kiss drops on his head. Probably akin to how Mum Constantine never quite got to give enough of, said and done. "Stop hurting yourself for no sure reason."

John Constantine has posed:
"I can't send someone else when I don't know what I'm looking for, Meggan and I don't thing the internet has what I'm looking for."

    John doesn't swat her way, but he's ... bloody well back to *trying* to hide how horrible he feels. He pulls the Silk he keeps behind his right ear 'in case of emergency' out - emergency being his coat's way over on the table - but when he tries to summon a little hellfire to bring the cigarette to life? It dances for a second on his fingertips and vanishes again. Exhaustion? Or the left behind of Holy power cancelling it?

    His hands are shaking, he's a pale green shade of white, he's cold sweating...

    "I'm fine, I'll come to bed after..."

    Then, well, to add insult to injury, he clears his throat, once... twice.

    Almost forgot about that little mess didn't they? Morrigan's magic can't hold back the curse of a Great Duke of Hell forever now, can it.

    One brief coughing fit and it passes, maybe it's just the normal smoker's cough? Doesn't matter, it still does him in further than he was already done in.

    "Just fetch me a bottle from the cupboard, will ya?" Faded blues are all the more blue for the red-rimming them, one foot in the grave is the looks of him, but he's back to his old ways - pushing boundaries and the limits of his own body because... he's damned well bloody fucking fine.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
He's probably going to fight this. No doubt that John hates weakness.

Meggan's towel lies against his back to separate the gooey awful healing remedy from her t-shirt. If it weren't there, it would matter. Arms loop around his chest and shoulders, pulling him to her.

John shaking like a leaf is a weakness she cannot manage, nor is it something she can address directly short of showing up at Astaroth's doorstep and choking him out until he bows. Or going to war. Or really none of those options make a lick of sense.

Cheek to his hair, she damn well grimaces and weathers the discomfort through the shaken bouts of his coughing. It cannot be a good thing for him to fall to wracked illness, down to his knees or spiralling out again.

He's damned well bloody fucking fine. Sure. Lie to yourself, man. That's fine.

The hug never lets him down, belated and not aflame as it is,

John Constantine has posed:
    At first it seems that he might fight it, might pull away with 'I have stuff to do' dancing from his still chapped lips.

    But in the end, his need for it outweighs his stubborn desire to deny it now.

    "I'm bloody tired, Meggan," he whispers as he leans into that hug instead of pulling away. Don't those few words just sum it up nicely? He's bone fucking *tired* and no where to go but onward really.

    John Constantine is, at the core of it, just a man - a mostly mortal man, that goes up against things so much larger than he is on the damned daily. He does it with a flip of the bird and a 'I don't give a fuck' attitude that pisses a lot of people off, but he does it without a care to what it does to *him* most days.

    But for this day, this one damned day, he's just bloody *tired*.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
Not letting go, despite having no ability to smell and that horrendously goopy compound is going to do them so much harm to anyone who happens to cross it. The smell can probably flatten his enemies at ten or twenty paces. Impressively long and far.

A hint of a smile can only be found in the peaceful in between moments when he isn't grumping, bitterly furious at the shape of his evening being trampled over by destiny. Destiny's a right bitch.

No real surprise.

She nudges him with her hip and doesn't ever drag, just suggests that he heads along to some very nice couch. They have to have chicken noodle soup around, don't they? Even a can? The kitchen is supplied somewhat by some sort of magical entity. "Stay put for fifteen minutes while I make you a cuppa and get you at least somewhat in fighting form. You can't run out to a library where the nearest bookwyrm's going to fry you."

John Constantine has posed:
    Lack of smell is probably a good thing, because John still has at least one hand with the smelly stuff drying on it when he turns around, takes Meggan's face gently between those lovely hands of his and leans in to capture her lips for a kiss, his own still a little cracked and dry from the night before.

    It's a gentle, sweet thing that kiss, not really meant to light fires, but that doesn't mean there isn't a touch of smolder.

    Faded denims, rimmed in red, capture leaf-greens in a lock. "That's all I need, love, to get me in fighting form," he murmurs softly. But, in the end, he pulls away, snags his Silks from his coat along with that cheap Bic ligher, and heads for that ugly ass, Elvira Style fainting couch he loves so much.

    Today the House provides what's needed, a fridge fully stocked with fresh vegetables and fruits, eggs, chicken, apple juice, milk and... of course a can of chicken noodle soup if such is required.

    Sprawled across that couch, lit Silk between his lips and stinking to high Heaven, he still sounds like the perfect angel when he mentions, "I think there's a can of that Reddi Whip stuff in there, love.... maybe some strawberries."