Post by Ryan D'Alteau on Oct 3, 2013 23:39:07 GMT -5
Victimised, deceived!
A black veil of insanity's crushing...
...like fire beating all of our disease!
The black veil of insanity misleads.
______________________________Korn - "Victimized"
Following the weekend he'd spent in Harlingen, Ryan sincerely doubted that even his fiancée's eventual reaction to what he'd done behind her back would be able to dent the sense of liberation he felt since returning home. For three days, Ryan Alcroft had effectively been erased from existence and, in his place, had been a young, attractive woman by the name of Calla McKnight. With a combination of his own desires and the helping hand of a biokinetic, he had ramped up the usual immersion he allowed himself to experience whenever he masqueraded as his feminine alter-ego.
More often than not, he was constrained by either his working environment or a reluctance for anyone outside his close inner circle to find out what really lay beneath his disguise. However, with Ophelia's help, there hadn't been any disguise. Instead of being an assistant in a business or a platonic friend to a group of women, Ryan had intentionally ventured out into the centre of Harlingen with the plan to be a fleeting lover; to have one-night stands with women who found him attractive. Not everything had gone exactly as he'd envisioned, but he wouldn't have changed a single moment. The experience was another step towards the objective Sophie had given him eight months prior: to determine the full extent of his sexual identity.
With no correspondence from Maurelle to worry about, Ryan had spent the day almost completely alone; getting up early enough to see Adele leave for work before returning to his own devices. In the past, he had entertained the habit of lazing around the condo and generally doing very little. Without a job, he had no real reason to exert himself beyond what was truly necessary and, with Adele's salary being more than enough to pay for their lifestyle, the act of finding a job hadn't really been all that important. Of course, it hadn't stopped him trying out of guilt. He may have been something of a slacker when he was certain he could get away with it, but he had always prided himself on pulling his weight when it mattered.
When he realised that he hadn't been doing so on a financial basis pretty much ever since he'd moved in with Adele, he'd begun to make an effort. He'd sent applications to whatever local businesses he felt his skills would be a sufficient fit and, whenever they'd called for him, had attended the odd interview. He might have been a little out of practice, but he'd gone through the motions as best he could. Annoyingly, he'd managed to strike out every single time. The fact that he'd effectively dropped out of college in order to move to the United States and hadn't bothered to pursue higher education upon his arrival was something he surmised reflected badly upon him. Were his life more mundane, he could have seen himself as a college student again but, with the tumultuous events surrounding his existence as a special, he hadn't found himself with the time. Nor had he the particular inclination to expose himself in an easily-locatable environment such as a college campus.
It had been one circumstance after another, steering his life down a path which had him perpetually in lock-step with his fiancée; devoted to her as she was to him and, while he would have gladly given everything he could to keep it that way, he couldn't help but think that there were some facets of his life that were suffering as a result. The local Subway had become a popular haunt of both his and Calla's over the past few months and, once again, he'd found himself craving something to eat; just to keep him going until dinner that evening. While he could have made something back at the condo, he had grown quite enamoured with their grilled Mexican chicken, especially when coupled with Italian herb bread and as much salad as could reliably be fit in between.
He was finishing off the remnants of just such a sandwich when he caught sight of a figure in the crowd ahead. Although plainly dressed, the tall man seemed to walk with purpose, slinking his way through and around the much slower pedestrians with ease. With the two of them being of similar height, Ryan found it easy to keep track of the back of the figure's head and shoulders, watching the lengthier strands of black hair as they danced around. It had been the man's posture which had first caught Ryan's eye. It struck him as somehow familiar; befitting of a certain personality he'd previously encountered. Instinctively, his mind settled on a vision of quiet arrogance; someone who seemed almost compelled to deify themselves due to their social status.
But this wasn't that man. That man - if he could be called such - hadn't been seen in years. It had been someone Ryan had never really liked, even when there'd been a semblance of grudging respect between them. No, this man was different. Taller, too. Just turn th'fuckin' corner..., was his curious train of thought. Now that he'd latched onto this man and become... intrigued by his presence, he wanted to see the rest of his face; to see if it was someone he actually knew. It was nagging him for all of twenty seconds before the man reached the end of the block and turned to his left, just enough for Ryan to get a glimpse of the rest of the person's face.
Jordan Mercer.
The last time he had seen him had been at the condo, last Hallowe'en, when he had "suddenly" dropped eighteen thousand dollars and effectively took over the building for an evening. Unbeknownst to Ryan, Jordan had "taken over" in more ways than one. With Khalidah's assistance, he had placed a series of consuming suggestions into the minds of everyone at the party, convincing them to assume the identities displayed by their costumes. As a result, his memory of the evening had been patchy at best. The most he'd been able to discern about the night in question was that he'd needed to stop someone looking vaguely like Adele from stabbing a member of royalty with a dagger. He wasn't entirely sure why.
Ryan's ex-girlfriend Michelle had been present at the party too and, thanks to Jordan's cerebral meddling, she had spent the whole night convinced she was a female version of Loki from the Marvel movies. She'd spiked a pharoah's bottle of wine with almost an entire tin of chilli powder, ruining the whole thing and essentially living up to her mantle as the Norse god(dess) of trickery, chaos and deception. Just like Ryan, she'd ended up remembering very little. Ryan wasn't really the best at following people like they did in the movies; a practice he'd never really seen as convincing in any way, but follow Jordan he did. There had always been something about him - even back at the party - which had been a little "off" to Ryan. The only reason he'd allowed the party to go ahead - aside from the five-figure sum they been paid - was the fact that Adele had told him it had been organised a couple of weeks in advance.
He'd had no idea why Jordan had shown up on South Padre Island and made use of their home specifically and, all these months later, he was equally at a loss as to why the man was here now. He may not have been Sherlock Holmes, but Ryan couldn't help but think that there was something happening behind the scenes; something he wasn't aware of. After all, wasn't it Adele who had repeatedly told him that there were to be no secrets in their relationship? Over the course of four blocks, the pedestrian traffic gradually thinned out as Ryan trailed Jordan across the island. On the causeway side of the island, there were less shops and hotels than by the sea and, unless he had an apartment on the island, Ryan wasn't entirely sure why Jordan would be walking in this direction.
That was, at least, until Jordan began to slow down. Everything was telling Ryan that he'd been discovered; that the man he'd been following had entertained the nagging feeling that something was amiss for long enough. With hardly anyone else around, it was hard for a six-foot-two man with blond hair to reliably blend in without making more undue noise. "Scoutin' 'round for another party venue, are we?", he inquired, trying to sound friendly... ish.