in the details with the devil {{jax||opius}}

[La Paradox]

[presto]

j a x c i n d e r s
"I need to lose control, caught up in this world."

Jax stood perfectly still as a statue for a moment, basking in the glow of the streetlight that washed over him. The velvet sky was dotted with those familiar, beautiful specks of light, the stars. Their presence was reassuring, comfort in the form of twinkling spheres of hot gas. "I wonder if the moon feels upstaged by the stars," he thought suddenly. "The stars radiate light on their own, but the moon has to reflect whatever sunshine is thrown its way."  The cold night  air gently caressed his face and crept down his spine, despite the rather warm black leather jack he was clad in. 

He reached up to his forehead and brushed his bangs to the side. Jax began to make his way down the street, the cold beginning to wear him down. He noticed that he could see wisps of smoke accompanying his breath, indicating just how deep the night's chill was. Numbness ruthlessly attacked his cheeks, his lips, his nose, much to his chagrin. Never had such mercilessness been witnessed  since Achilles had slew Hector, and he felt sorry for himself that he was the recipient; but of course, this was the natural cruelty of winter, and he hardly took it personally.

Reaching a fork in the road, Jax chose to walk down the path he knew would lead him into the outskirts of the District. He recalled that there was a run-down bar resided somewhere down that road, and he figured that would be a good place to seek some warmth. Darkness shrouded the path he tread, forcing his eyes to adjust. He rather missed the guidance of the street lamps. Realizing this, he couldn't help but let a laugh escape his lips. "It's funny, what we wish for sometimes." The mild absurdity of it couldn't have possibly amused him any more than it had; it was pretty funny.

Relief flooded Jax from head to toe. After wandering in the dark, he'd manage to stumble upon  the bar. It wasn't yet closed down for the night, much to his excitement, but he'd suspected as much. He entered as inconspicuously as a shadow, assuming that nobody would bother him for his age as long as he didn't try to order drinks or anything. Near the back of the establishment, there was a table that was vacant, and Jax took a seat there. Warmth was already doing him good, he could practically feel the color rushing back into his skin.

[/presto]

[cass]

OPIUS HOLMES

eight legs to the wall, hit the gas, kill them all

He always operated best in the stillness of the night. When the rest of the world had fallen asleep they were all wide awake, creeping around the corners of the district, watching from the rooftops and edges of this small, unimportant world of theirs. He stood, at that moment, on the edge of a roof, gazing over the city he called his home, watching as streetlights flickered, as black figures stepped into the pale wash light of a street, before disappearing, being swallowed whole by the darkness that had enveloped the district. It was terribly boring, his fingers itched, his feet shifted impatiently on the tiles of the roof, waiting for their next order to move, so he could be off once more.

Uncatchable. That’s what he was. When he was up here, surrounded by the night, the stars twinkling above he was unbeatable. The roofs were his home, he knew where his feet went, he knew how to step quietly, but quickly, to avoid cracked tiles or loose fittings. It was instinct for him, up here. He wasn’t afraid to leap from one roof to another, to jump onto thin edges, where most people would be swallowed by their won fear, as the dizziness overcame them. He didn’t freeze, instead he pushed himself further, pushed himself to the point where his fingers would scramble for a hold on the edge of the world and he’d be tipping, tipping, tipping, the ground moving closer and closer, waiting for him to meet his fate and he’d smile.

It would sneak across his face, a devilish grin as he drew himself to a stop, upside down, to the side, no matter where he was he always stopped and if he didn’t he’d die. And never once did that scare him. His eyes flickered away from the quiet district, and upwards for a moment, up towards the stars. They were just as silent and annoying as ever, he realised, with a smirk. They didn’t do much, and yet most people seemed ever so fascinated by them. They rather annoyed him, staying up there, as though they’re all high and mighty and powerful.

A quick movement from the corner of his eye dragged his attention away from the stars. He twisted, looking to his left. A boy somewhere around his age moved into the street before heading to a door, of one of the more noisy places in the district. He opened it, and for a moment the muffled silence was broken as the ruckus that built in a bar poured into the streets. The sounds of laughter and chatter and fun, filled his ears to the brim. He often visited that bar, on nights like this he craved the excitement that one got from bar fights, after having drank a little too much. Besides, tonight Saturn wasn’t on guard duty, therefore returning home a little plastered wouldn’t end with him being kicked onto the streets before dawn, being forced to run until he couldn’t anymore.

Reaching the decision to head inside, he grinned, before moving. His feet slid onto the next roof, and within moments he was leaping across another and another and then there was only empty space, and that exhilarating rush before his feet slammed into the ground, and he slipped into a roll, unwilling to damage his strong legs. Getting back to his feet in one swift movement he jogged forwards, before entering the bar.

template by Chelsey

[La Paradox]

[presto]

j a x c i n d e r s
"I need to lose control, caught up in this world."

The room's atmosphere was pervaded by a wretched scent of alcohol and danger. Needless to say, Jax was far out of his comfort zone in this place. Never thought I'd see this much stupidity concentrated in District Three, he thought disdainfully, watching as a young guy demonstrated his inability to hold his liquor. He was leaning over the nearest trashcan, vomiting until Jax thought the kid's lungs would start bleeding from the acidity. Nearby, his equally idiotic friends whooping and cheering him on.

Lunacy seemed to be the order of the night, he supposed. The intoxicated guy's friends were reminiscent of a gang of hyped up lab chimpanzees. Sure, that metaphor worked. Jax recalled having to perform biochemical experiments on chimpanzees before; the only difference was that these bar patrons weren't locked in cages. Unfortunately, they were allowed to roam free. Sighing, Jax realized he had been twiddling his thumbs while lost in his observatory train of thought.

Jax couldn't help but smirk at the next opportunity that arose for him to satisfy his habit of people watching. Near the end of the bar, an older man of around thirty or so was shamelessly flirting with a girl probably ten years or so his junior. She was glaring at him through glassed over his eyes, and he was staring right back at her in his sober lust. It seems pretty cut and dry, Jax thought, annoyed and amused by the man's failure at engaging the girl in amorous activity. No chemistry, eh.

It was at this precise moment that the door to the bar opened, and a brazen young kid around Jax's age came strutting over the threshold. He had an air of belonging, and so Jax quickly deduced that the boy had been in this bar before. Arching an eyebrow, Jax figured the bar really needed to step up its evidently porous security. Two underage patrons in less than an hour; seemed legit to him. There was something about this newcomer that captivated Jax's attention and simply refused to relinquish it. He couldn't quite place it, but the guy had this atmosphere about him.

Getting up, the normally shy young chemist strode up to the young man. Standing in front of him, Jax felt a bit withered, as he normally did when directly engaging with other people. "Um, excuse me," he said softly, avoiding eye contact with the subject of his bid for attention, "but I just noticed you come in and you seem to be around my age. Are you escaping from the cold, too?"

[/presto]

[cass]

OPIUS HOLMES

I'm in the de-details with the devil

The place, in every aspect, is the same as always. It’s not a miserable place at all, sure the building itself is hanging on the edge of destruction, more so then that if a safe place to actually be in. But you don’t notice the cracks in the wall, or the fact that the sign above the door is missing three of the four letters. You notice the people inside, and even though it has that general crowd of thieves, beggars and bastards it has a few special people as well. His eyes quickly took in the room, noticing the drunken idiots, incapable of holding their liquor (he had, of course, never been so weak), of the girl in the corner with the boy, of the older man perving and the young boy hidden away from the rest.

It was that boy that he had seen enter, sitting in the corner, hidden away from everyone else. If he hadn’t been too preoccupied with an urge to drink he’d have raised a questioning eyebrow, wondering why he sulked at the back and didn’t join in. Someone would have given him a drink, in this place. He paid him little more attention as he stepped into the circle of smoke and the heavy smell of liquor and vomit, and the air of a bar swallowed him whole. He held a weird fascination with a bar life, liking the way that the smoke swirled around the depths of the shop, and the way that the volume increased tenfold as you stepped inside, he liked the muffled sound of the broken world outside, and how as soon as you opened just a crack of it, it would explode and you’d hear it all. At times, it was like its own little separate world.

It made his throat burn, but at the same time it brought him to life. Sliding on over to the bar he demanded his usual drink, the bar keep had long since stopped pestering him and forcing him to see id. He’d given up on trying to prevent Opius Holmes from consuming alcohol, one too many times Opius had come in, hand wrapped around some toxic street created substance, drunk off his face. The barkeep has simply decided that it was safer for him to drink what he was offering.

He could remember clearly why he had picked up the habit of drinking, but now it was just that, a habit. He drank because he liked it, yes it helped with his re-occurring nightmares, and the terror of his past trials, it eased his mind and numbed the pain. That was what it had been for at the start, now he smoked and drank and did all of it because it was fun, it was still there helping, but it just didn’t mean the same thing anymore. He turned; drink in hand to find that boy, who had been sitting in the corner, standing directly in front of him.

"Um, excuse me,” he spoke softly, eyes averted, "but I just noticed you come in and you seem to be around my age. Are you escaping from the cold, too?"

Smirking he shook his head, finding the question proposed to be quit unusual. Opius was a confident young boy, he was by no means popular, but at the same time he had no problem being himself, and speaking out and being very, very loud. He laughed, before clapping the boy on the shoulder with his hand, ”have a drink, if you’re that cold it’ll warm you up a bit.” He passed the drink he had been given over, already reaching towards the bar to get another.

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