7264/Sun peerin' through the blinds

Sun peerin' through the blinds
Date of Scene:	07 August 2021
Location:	The Laughing Magician
Synopsis:	=Phoebe stops by with donuts, gets incidental magic lesson. John's recovery is sped up after accidentally taking a magical car battery to the tongue. Chas is forever long-suffering, and Meggan is wont to push glassess off the bar and pounce on John in proper feline fashion.
Cast of Characters:	John Constantine, Phoebe Beacon, Meggan Puceanu

---

John Constantine has posed:
    It's the morning after yet another mystical crisis of epic proportions and John's taking up seat on his bar stool. It's been a week, hell it's been a month. Even for John Constantine, the amount of Mystic Bad that's happened lately is a little much. It's starting to show.

    Everything *hurts* and John looks like *everything* hurts. He's a blonde Brit that spends very little time outdoors when it's daylight, so he's pale to begin with. Today? Man looks like a ghost. The dark circles that are starting to form around his eyes are darker still in contrast to the pale.

    Ashtray, lit Silk Cut and a bottle and a glass at his elbow, as per the usual, when things aren't *usual* at all, have Chas side-eyeing him but saying nothing. It's likely words have already been said and Chas has reached the point of 'if he didn't look like it'd kill him outright, I'd punch his bloody face' already.

    His hand shakes when he lifts his glass to take something between a sip and a swig.

    "Bloody hell, Chas, stop lookin' at me like that, what am I supposed to do?"

    Chas polishes glasses.

    "Really, mate? Tell me what I'm supposed to do? Turn my back on all it?"

    ...Chas polishes glasses.

    Tension is *thick*, yes it is.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    The tension is thick, but you know what's thicker than the tension? Probably treacle. That stuff's thick.

    The whine of someone's sport bike might be heard outside as she parks nearby the Laughing Magician. The rider removes her helmet (safety first!) and shakes out her hair a little bit, giving a face when some of the relaxed curls drift into said face, and then goes to bring the box in, taking her bag and a drink container out of the other saddle bag, and walking in baring a box of baked goods and a flat of teas.

    So when the teenager walks in, and gives a friendly smile to Chas and a musical 'Good morning!' before something draws her attention to John, and her face falls. Her dark eyes go wide as she looks the mage up and down and then goes:

    "... well." she looks down at the tea and variety pick donuts. The happy white and orange box goes onto the counter as she makes her way down and sits next to John, with one stool between them for respect.

    "... what the crap."

John Constantine has posed:
    In a lot of ways, Chas and John are more like a married couple than Meggan and John, it's just more of the nagging and less of the sexy fun times is all. Meggan tends to panic when he doesn't come home, tend to him when he finally makes it and then drops it to let him continue to be well, *him*.

    Chas not so much. "Tell her John, tell her how you ran off to Prague, half mystically gutted already and then nearly got literally gutted by some freaky cult familiar shadow cat and now, instead of being *in bed* where you belong you're sitting at the bloody bar like it's any other day."

    "Be redundant if I told her now, wouldn't it, mate."

    "*Asshole*." Chas polishes glasses.

    "It's not as bad as all that, luv, he's just being a dramatic bird's all," John asides to Phoebe before polishing off the contents of his glass.

    A little gesture of his hand and the damned jukebox blares, 'Man! I Feel Like a Woman' by Shania Twain. Someone's poking at the Chasbear, not good man, not good.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Phoebe takes a deep breath, and opens the donut box. ALl the good ones are there. She takes off her biking gloves, and sticks them in a pocket of her leather jacket before she takes the jacket off, revealing today's free promotional T-shirt is announcing free admission day at the GOtham Museum... in 2016.

    "Physical or mystical damage, like the fork?" she questions, and she reacehs into her bag.

    WHat seventeen year old girl unrolls surgeon's tools on a bar? She's got packs of dressings for wounds. She has surgical needles. Antiseptic. Syringes. Little bottles marked with codes.

John Constantine has posed:
    "Physical as far as can be told," Chas replies through a clenched jaw, because well it *was* some weird shadow cat that done it.

    There's that thing again, that silent John/Chas communication.

    Change it, or I'll smash the thing, asshole. ~ What don't like a little Shania in the morning? ~ John, I'm not joking, not in the mood. ~ Well, that's why you never get laid. ~ John... ~ Fine!

    Another little gesture of his hand and the track switches to 'I Am Woman' by Helen Reddy. Rather than smash the jukebox in the bar that's actually half his, Chas snarls, "*Asshole*.* ...and slams the glass he's polishing down to head for the back.

    John eyes all that on the bar and shakes his head, "No, that's not happenin', luv."

    He's not letting a *kid* get all surgical up in his business.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "John, no offense but I have the distinct feeling that I could take you in a fight if I wanted to at this moment. And Chas might let me." she states, though she knows Chas would probably boot her from the bar. "I have painkillers in my bag. I was going to offer you one so that maybe you would get some sleep for a day. It's a pain to open without long nails or something sharp." she states, and she looks at John.

    "My instinct would be to put the healing powers to use, but you seem relunctant to ask, and I have no idea if treating you with them would be different." she shrugs a moment. "Also, would be applying dressings and antiseptic to damage unless I had to, say, remove a bullet from a lung."

    "Also, do you have anything /good/ in that jukebox? 'Cause I've got my phone and could play some calming, binural beats for studying."

John Constantine has posed:
    Truth be told of it, those two tracks aren't even available on the jukebox, or they weren't until now. He was just being an ass, because he feels like straight shite and it's his way of dealing. Which is also why Chas opted to not break his jaw on top of all of it.

    "I got pain pills, luv, in spades. Can't bloody well take'm when the world's goin' to hell now, can I?" Pale blues, red-rimmed and dark circled finally shift to look direction at her. "Pretty sure that glow of yours would just be the final nail, wouldnit? I'm not exactly as pure on the inside as I look on the out."

    He pours another drink, somewhere between swig and sip, swirled around, swallowed... he settles the glass back on the table before. "Look, you're a good kid but it's probably best that we just keep our business to finding out what's after you and why. I'm guessin' the why has to do with the what of you."

    Keep'm at arm's length they don't get hurt right? Only two people in his life have ever truly gotten past that arm, one just walked to the back room and the other... well, she's a pretty little blonde fae.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "You can if you have a medic monitoring you to short-shot you adreniline to keep your heart beating and access to a state-of-the art--" Phoebe pauses as she registers the rest of the argument, both that she was tipping her hand a little much, and that she got told off in a more cutting way.

    She blinks a moment, and then just gives a nod. She rolls up the pack haphazardly, wrapping the drawstring around it and she puts it back in her bag.

    "Good. Fine. Then I don't... really have anything else." she stammers. She doesn't look at John, but she does slide over the box of fast-food dough rings.

John Constantine has posed:
    It's been a week, it truly has, more than a week. Everything, the 'all of it', so much of it that he can't just turn his back on, it has him in that skewed frame of mind, the 'everyone around me dies' frame of mind. Might have something to do with why he's being such a wanker to Chas too. ...although that's a vain endeavor, Chas's weathered it before and will again.

    He reaches out to snag Phoebe's wrist. It's not a bruising thing, but it's firm; attention grabbing and 'hot', he's burning up.

    "Do you *want* to die, luv? Do you, because it'll sure 'nuff happen if you keep comin' around here, around *me*."

    Will she feel it, beyond the heat of his skin, just how bad he's hurting? Demon cursed, mystically forked and now shadow cat clawed? It's a true testament to his ability to say 'fuck the world and the rules' that he's even standing.

    "Let her go, John, don't take your demons out on her," Chas, quiet from the doorway to the back room.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Phoebe can feel it. She feels the way his skin burns. She can feel the effects of everything in his body. Liver trying to keep up with the alcohol. His kidneys. Bladder. Stomach. Pancreas. The poor man was, indeed, a real piece of work. Her own aura, the calming, peaceful feelings she mits might grate against the demon blood, the ambient healing trying to pierce through and reach and enrich the body around the injuries to speed healing. It tingles.

    The teenager breathes out. Her eyes are closed, and she reaches her other hand to put over his. She is practicing a lot of restraint, both to not instinctively try to heal him because she cares for him and not grab his arm and twist him off his barstool and shove him to the ground. He would feel her whole body tremble. See the movement of her lip.

    "Nemo sibi nascitur." she states, in Latin, in a very even tone to John. Nobody is born for self alone.

    That hand over his hand is raised up to gently press against John's haggard face as her eyes open and she looks at John.

John Constantine has posed:
    Except maybe when they kill their own twin in utero and their mother dies in the process of giving birth, that's a whole lot of born for self alone.

    That tingling feeling sets off a chain reaction that starts with those faded denim blues of his just widening a fraction, him tensing, uncertain.

    All that tension explodes when Phoebe touches John's face. He pushes himself off the bar stool, his feet get all tangled in the bolted to the floor thing and he goes sprawling.

    *THUNK* The back of his head connects painfully with the floor. Little startburts dance in his vision, blood blooms over the left side of his shirt where the stitches of a fae-ling split and tear; her work meant for clothing not skin, but it's the best they had to work with last night.

    Chas, for all his bite and bark, is taking the quickest path from A to B when John goes down and that's vaulting over the bar, running the length of it, and vaulting the other side. "John!" The name speaking volumes from 'you bloody idiot' to 'that's my brother and I'd like to not die inside without him'.

    Phoebe, being so close, will definitely get there first should she actually chose to get there.

    For a second, it seems as if he may have knocked him fool self unconscious, until...

    "Bollocks..."

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "JOHN!" Phoebe squeaks out as John tilts backwards, knocking the teas and coffee over, spilling them accross the bar. She grabs the gloves from her leather jacket pocket. She gets to him, and takes out a penlight and begins to check him over, now leather-glad fingers to try and stimy some of the magic power on (though she can lay on hands wearing freaking armor, not sure what the bike gloves would do!), and she begins to triage. Check his eyes for the pupils not being the same side, look for reaction. Check his neck -- and then he speaks.

    She sits back a moment, holding his shoulder so his head isn't against the ground and then looks over to the blossoming blood.

    "Is that one of the wounds from last night?" she asks -- but she's looking to Chas. Obviously, John can't make responsible decisions right at this moment.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
Meggan, when not involved in mystical problems, actually has a life. An active life involving environmental rallies, stirring up resistance to Nestle and other hated corporations, and spending a disgusting amount of time engaged with people in twelve timezones to manage a generational uprising. Extinction Rebellion may be the loudest of those mouthpieces, but there are many willing to protest chopping down forests or large foundations trying to purchase up whole island nations. Sometimes, she even goes to Atlantis. Hey, she's an honorary citizen per their king. She has every right to descend under their waves, court water-witch checking in to say boo.

Things aren't exactly great here, are they?

Instead, there is one hopeful cat moseying into the Laughing Magician. Street-cat, skinny, young, attitude-driven with a curlicue tail. Never mind cats don't open doors. Never mind the really awful black version of a feline-adjacent thing ripped John open like a tin-can, which Phoebe can measure with claws that would've laughed at bone. This one isn't black, it's a remarkably brindled and patchy thing with oversized ears twitching his way.

Pink mouth opens, a bleating 'mrat!' pouring out. An insistent peep on this side of indignant. Little paws bat down on the ground, haunches bunch, and the cat hops up to land on a table, springing to the next and trotting over it. Then springing to another while circling around the downed magus and the Gothamite healer, or possibly going to the bar to shove a glass off it while Chas is occupied.

"MEW." A blink. Mewmewmemwmew.

John Constantine has posed:
    Every man has a breaking point, a point where things are just too much, where it gets to the realm of unmanageable. John has not reached that point yet, through sheer stubbornness. He swats at the light, "Stawp." He reaches up to rub the back of his head; no blood but a good goose egg already forming. Isn't that supposed to be a good sign with bonks to the head? Hell, he's not a doctor, maybe that's a wives tale.

    Gloves, in fact, do not work. His jaw's clenched, teeth grinding together when he hisses out, "Luv, you're *hurting me*."

    "Yeah, that's from..." Wait, what? Hurting him? Chas's eyes narrow a little in Phoebe's direction. "Maybe you should step back." His tone is even, his expression conflicted. Surely she's not here *hurt* John or the wards would light up like Christmas trees and, besides, she's such a sweet kid. But they've both been fooled by powerful enough beings to blast through John's wards before, innit true? "Give him some space." Something Chas and the blasted cat don't seem to care to do. Chas is kneeling on the other side of John and...

    He sneezes when that cat's circling causes a tail to brush under his nose. Nggggg, that sneeze hurt.

    His arm goes up to cover his face, he's battling barfing all over everyone, so be warned. "You gotta pull it apart luv, if you wanna help... you have to take that blasted light out of the healing."

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    At the firs understanding that she's actively hurting John, Phoebe plants her feet on the floor and slides back, and she keeps sliding until she hits the wall, looking to Chas, the cat, and John. Her eyes are wide, and she pulls her legs up to make herself as small as possible, trying to force that aura to heel and retract back into herself. She is breathing hard and trying to get a hold of herself when she speaks:

    "In the bottom of my bag there is a separate zipper. There are premade field-dressings. His body heat will activate the lidocaine paste and provide local anesthetic, and if you push the wound together as you apply it they'll act as butterfly stitches. They're in ten inch segments and can be cut with the surgical shears in the front pocket to size. They'll tingle because of the painkiller and antibiotic in the paste will sting and burn until the lidocane takes affect, they're completely mundane. Applying pressure to the wound will stop the bleeding and warm the paste faster for activation--" she states, eyes still wide as she tries to not blink. Blink, and she'll cry.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
The cat is a cat. It will do absolutely nothing it was asked. When humans worshipped them as gods in Egypt, as elsewhere, they never forgot it. Of course not; it was their damn birthright, and woe to anyone else who thinks otherwise.

Unlike Tara, this cat is just a cat. Sleek, a little on the underweight side, long tail swishing in sharp flicks back and forth. For all the old wives' tales about inherently magical abilities, the wards are still keyed to prevent random aggro from trash mob mortals, and presumably felines. Still, here it is. A paw lands like metal rebar pressing down onto John's arm, and the mincing, dainty thing moves away from him, sort of, long enough to presumably not trigger a gag reflex or any other allergic reaction. The demanding "I have never been fed in my life, get me a bowl" peer grows insatiably angrier at Chas, of all people, that insistent *peep!* mew becoming very elongated and shouty. Probably sounds a lot like Chas yelling at the jukebox or John discovering his secret stash of vices has been offed by the house.

"Mew!" He will get the message, surely. Scooping up said cat of many colours is a terrible decision, given how wriggly and sinuous the feline can be, and if it's going to be a point of contention?

Chas is holding an octopus. Then a cat, hitting the ground, twitching its tail, and serenely stepping back onto John. Phoebe hasn't been forgotten. The cat stares at her, then her bag, then her. STARE.

John Constantine has posed:
    Chas goes for the bag immediately, intent on doing just what the girl asked, but he finds himself intercepted by the cat, that he knows... isn't as much cat as it seems to be.

    "No!" John barks, the sound of his own loudness sending pain through his throbbing head. "She wants it fixed, she can bloody well fix it!" He forces himself to sit up, beneath Chas's withering glare and, potentially tempting a cat to claw his face off.

    "John, that's not fair..." Chas's rumbles as he lets the cat down, not by choice.

    "No, Chas, she can *do* this. Fix it, Phoebe," he near snarls. "Bottle down that light and *fix it* without it. Unless you want me to bleed out while you're thinking about it?" Really, there's no danger of that. He's already healed of those nasty wounds more than any other man would be by this time.

    "Fix it, Phoebe!"

    Welcome to the John Constantine school of magic. There are no refunds on tuition.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Well, Fuck.

    Phoebe, like the good doctor she wanted to be when she was little and helping to patch her stuffed animals up with Doc McStuffins branded items hesitates.

    Fix it, Phoebe!

    Turn down the light. The 'Glow' about her in her panic fades, and pushes herself forward, sliding on the bar's floors back to John's side.

    Tamp down the light. Concentrate on your will, just like binding that dark spirit in Whitechapel. The aura still tingles; that she's not able to turn down all the way. She tries to feel out her own power, The Light, The Healing... and just turns the healing. There is still Light, but it's more like licking a nine volt than getting hooked up to a car battery by your nipples and tongue. Focus your Will.

    And Phoebe desperately wanted to prove that she was worth having around.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
Fix it, Phoebe. That's a book deal right there.

Better than Wreck It, Ralph, anyway. Little boys and girls can aspire to fix things, like quantum accelerators that broke down or the Koreas or possibly the bank shattered stealing a few quarters from big brother Bozohead.

The cat remains sitting on John. He can try to kick the cat off. Kicking felines is bad luck, but the man lives inside a stew of it, so maybe that all balances out. He ought to be able to knock himself free, crawl away, and scream if he wants. The octopus, all bets are off there, but the fuzzy, skinny street-cat who has decided to sit within range of his wounded self and imperiously shout about being fed -- the only true concern in the world -- is still put-out.

Phoebe is healing, no *food* is here thank you, humans, and it decides to lick its paw and groom over its forehead and ear with a circular motion. Just three feet down, totally possible to get away, Constantine.

Welcome to the Insouciant Boarding School, where mistakes are tolerated long as they slide by, and knocking down the teacher a few pegs is part of the score.

John Constantine has posed:
    Does the bastard look a little smug? Maybe so! Because when he shifts his sight to the magical spectrum, he can *see* it happening. So he wasn't wrong. It's always a fifty/fifty that, him being wrong or right.

    When she finally begins, even a nine volt stings a little and it shows in the way he hisses in a gasp of a breath and lets it out with, "Do. Not. Stop."

    Because while it may sting, something else is happening; the wounds on his side are knitting back together, bleeding stopped. Further than that? While the mystical damage done his soul and the very core of him might be too much for her to banish completely, the absolute most painful edges of it are fading. Now, instead of feeling like he's dying with every move he makes, he just feels like he's been hit by a bus. It's a difference that'll matter in the grand scheme, keep him in the game longer; until his own body can suss that mess out and heal proper from it.

    Affection creeps into his voice when he murmurs, "I knew you could do it, luv." ... words likely worth gold to the ears of a little orphan.

    As far as the cat? No matter what form Meggan takes, John would know her - she owns heart, holds a piece of his blackened soul in a little white rock, the two of them are connected in ways normal minds can't fathom these days. Also, well, he's a pretty sighted and skilled mage to boot. "Not my favorite kind of pussy, luv," he coos at the blasted thing. Good Lord, John!

    Chas had been over there holding his breath through it all, waiting to see of Phoebe would manage to fix it or, instead, fry his best mate with Holy light. Stressful that. So when John's all cracking jokes like it's Saturday, he stalks back behind the bar to... polish glasses with a vigor and vengeance.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    TPHoebe hears the gasp. She lifts her hands slightly, but when she is told not to stop?

    She can feel the ragged edges of her own exhaustion, her own blood rushing in her ears -- or was it John's hard to say. The wounds on his side and his chest knit with nary a scar. Physical wounds and wears and tears are eased. It feels like cold water rushing the wrong way through his veins, but she is doing her best.

    That stuff, deeper down? Old wounds that ache on cold nights or tingle when rain's coming, the dark edges of his soul and the core aren't something she can touch -- not without blasting them (and John) away with Light, she supposes, but she envisions binding the ragged edges like darning fabric to keep it from tearing -- or leaking. For all the good it might do for John, she is trying.

    And when he gives those words, affection in his voice? Well. Might as well hold her heart in his teeth... until he coos at Megg.

    Well. It *is* John, after all.

    And as she reaches the limit of what she can do with John's physical form, she lifts her hands. For a split second, if he's paying attention, there is a circle on her left hand, but quick as a lightbulb going out, it's gone.

    And Phoebe sits back on her haunches, and then makes a face before she reaches for one of the mostly spilled coffee cups.

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
The cat version of shut up is prancing up to sit flat on John's chest and headbutting him. Silk-cut fur rubs over his cheek and across his nose, the cheekrub going all the way to his eyebrow. And she performs that again, disregarding anything less than tiny murder-fangs could take a chunk out of that English face as a pittance for disregarding her.

The tail's nearly prehensile, petting John of its own accord. Whiskers twitch while the cat watches Phoebe, though, still kneading that shoulder beneath her. Almost painful, that knead, even lacking claws. Though the murderous talons are perfectly sharp, sheathed, a little at the ready. Little healer doing big healing things gets a whisker twitch for the trouble, the big green-gold eyes peering.

"Mrat." Pity they don't have Thor. He might speak Cat.

In the meantime, she knead-knead-kneads and the coffee pot lands with a detectable thud on the bar in front of Phoebe where Chas did not put it. No one did.

Cats and ghosts, man.

John Constantine has posed:
    "Get off me," John grouses at the cat. He eventually relents and gives her a little scritch behind her ears. But his color's back almost to norm and when he dares to pluck Meggan up so he can push himself to his feet, he does so easily.

    "Feel like I could take on a demon army," he announces. It pulls a groan and a skyward glance from Chas.

    Careful what you wish for John Constantine, the Fates are always listening, innit true?

    He pops the fuzzy pussy down on the bar and chastises, "We have a mouse problem in the back, what good are you?" ...but he lowers his head closer to the feline for a head bump.

    Finally his attention turns back to Phoebe. "You did good, luv, keep practicin'."

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Phoebe downs the spilled coffee, and then reaches for the coffeepot to pour another little bit in, swishes it around, and then drinks that down.

    "Hello, Meggan." she greets the cat after a moment, "forgive me for not saying so earlier. Nice ears." she states with a grump.

    "Chas, ig you five me a cloth or some paper towels, I'll clearn up the mess." she states as she slowly sits back down on the barstool, and makes a 'bleh' face.

    But, when John says she did good, she cracks a little smile.

    "Well good. Because I already told my friends you were going to help me refine my powers; I'd hate for you to make a liar out of me." she wrinkles her nose again, and drinks more coffee.

    "So, what's next?"

Meggan Puceanu has posed:
The nice ears flick. Pink nose pressed to John's cheek, sniffing suspiciously, she chirps in his ear, that rolling escalation that would be an earful if it were not half purr.

Someone could argue cat purrs are suitable entirely for healing things. John apparently knows nothing about this by putting her down. The cat stares at him, then promptly saunters over to Phoebe and weaves around her ankles, chirping an inquiry again.

Chas is merely the recipient of a steady where-is-my-food-meow. Because he needs to not put two and two together. Really, full-grown Englishwoman versus scrawny cat.

Once John turns his attention away for more than three seconds, the feline wiggles its haunches in that telltale side-to-side shimmy. Those green eyes turn black, pupils getting huge, focused fully on a target. Wiggle. Wiggle.

And then, poof. POUNCE!