metalogs | [Closed] Judged By the Company He Keeps

Who: Huvrye

effiomsfavorite and those close to him
What: Guess who's finally getting shot!
When: April 14-15
Where: Jason's safehouse, Huvrye's apartment
Content Warnings: Violence, gore, probably some PTSD, further CWs marked in threads as needed

Birds of a Feather (Narrative)

For all that Huvrye has been warning people against associating with the Red Hood, citing just how dangerous the gang leader can be, the consequences of his actions sure do blindside him.

Because he's been associating with the Red Hood - three times over a span of months, but two of them very visible and the third well known in crime circles - and people have noticed. Specifically the D'Amico family, who are only on Huvrye's radar under 'organized crime; do not interact.'

Which is why he's not prepared to find half a dozen of them waiting for him as he lands in an alley just outside of neutral territory, demanding he come with them and brandishing guns when he refuses.

Great. Wonderful.

The fight, such as it is, is mercifully short. There are no metas among the people the D'Amicos sent - they'd probably thought he couldn't do much more than fly, and weren't prepared to face down everything a Lasardhin homunculus is capable of bringing to combat. Two of them are down from broken spines or broken skulls, brick walls cracked and broken from where they'd died on impact. Three are torn apart, missing limbs or chunks of chest or half a head as a result of Huvrye bringing his alchemy to bear. The last has been shot with his own gun.

Huvrye stands, leaning heavily against a wall, covered in blood both his and not, with a pair of gunshot wounds in his gut for his trouble. Great. This is exactly what he needs tonight. With that much gunfire, someone's going to investigate sooner or later, which means he needs to get out of here soon. Neutral territory is close, and with it the Descendant. He can hole up in the safehouse overnight and heal for a bit. He shrugs his jacket off, wraps it tightly around his waist, around the wounds, and ties it off as best he can, and activates the magical disguise hidden under his sleeve. Wings hidden, hair and eyes and ears different, and a full foot shorter in appearance, he heads out of the alley looking like a normal human, walking quickly, pushing through the pain until he makes it to the safehouse (carefully, carefully, making sure he hadn't been followed) and slips inside.

1. Jumpscare (Closed to Dylan)

Thankfully, there'd been no one in the safehouse when Huvrye had arrived, and he'd set about taking care of himself - laying out towels in the corner, cleaning out his wounds as best he can, and applying pressure. He'll heal - it'll take a bit, but he's got enough energy that it'll happen sooner rather than later - but he's not going anywhere else tonight. After a couple of hours, the bleeding stops, and he passes out on top of the towels, fully intending to sleep the wounds off.

He's still very much asleep in the morning...lying on the floor, on bloodied towels, in bloodied clothes. Not the best impression to give anyone heading into the safehouse without context.

2. Just a Flesh Wound (Closed to Huvrye's friends)

He spends the morning recovering in the safehouse (charging his phone, apologizing yet again to Dylan, doing his best to make sure the D'Amicos don't know where he's gone to ground) before he heads home in the early afternoon. He leaves in disguise, drops it to fly back to his neighborhood, and activates another disguise to get in the front door of his apartment building. He sighs heavily when he walks in the door. He needs to clean up. He needs to get something to eat. He needs to rest - the bleeding may have stopped, but it'll still be a bit before his wounds are fully healed. And he needs to talk to quite a few people - he hadn't realized so many people had noticed he'd gone missing.

(It'd only been a day. They cared that much?)

He closes the door behind him and heads towards his room.

[I'm open to Huvrye's friends having heard from other friends about his situation/injury - if we haven't already talked about it and you think yours would know/care, let me know and we'll do a thing!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"If they don't, we'll figure out a plan of action then." It's a we he has no intent of actually fulfilling - Leo has no idea who they're dealing with him, and if Huvrye can keep the information from him, then hopefully he can keep Leo out of danger.

(Or Leo will just throw himself headfirst into an adjacent danger, but Huvrye can at least try.)

No, he doesn’t know exactly who he’s looking for, but there are ways to find out… Like, through Red Hood…

He pockets that thought for later. At least Huvrye is agreeing to include him if something happens (or at least talking like he is) so Leo will calm down and focus on the problem in front of him.

“Okay… I’m actually not too bad at planning, so don’t worry, I can help.” He’s going to keep inserting himself in this situation just in case Huvrye is being tricky, but for now…

“Do you need anything? Do painkillers work for you?”

Leo don't you dare.

"Okay." Pushing the problem further down the line is probably not the best of plans, but given that the plan will depend entirely on whether the D'Amicos continue to pursue him, it's about all Huvrye can do right now while still keeping Leo relatively calm and uninvolved.

He's about to deny needing anything, but pauses. He'd used up his reserves healing - he'd gotten some rest, but he still needs to be ready in case this isn't over. He remembers tearing through the tunnels of abandoned Sestrinn, on the verge of collapse, nearly dying - nearly letting Yin die - because he'd been too run down. He can't let that happen here. "Yeah, but not for long. I need a meal - if I order something, can you get the door when it gets here?" He'd be fine to get it himself - it'd just be a little pain - but maybe letting Leo help will calm him down a bit.

He dares.

"Yeah, I think I can handle that." He'll probably hologram watch it so he doesn't startle the poor delivery person, but he's on it otherwise. "I can grab you some meds while you order, just a sec."

And he's up! And off to wherever they keep their medicines, a stash that Leo has bought in case of various inevitable consequences of superheroing (and also in case he catches the flu, which in Leo's experience is... not something Huvrye would want to deal with, if they can help it).

Helping does help Leo calm down, though, so mission accomplished there. It gives him something to do with all the excess energy he built up worrying about him.

That is literally the opposite of what he told you to do!

"Thanks." Huvrye lets him go and pulls up the delivery app to figure something out. He wants pho, but he also really does not want pho, because having it now means running the risk of associating it with recovering from a gunshot wound. Pizza is out for that same reason - they have pizza too often for him to risk that.

There's a hamburger and fries ordered and awaiting delivery by the time Leo returns to the living room. It'll be a bit before food arrives, but at least it's coming.

Trying to order him around was the first mistake!

Leo returns soon enough, passing the bottle off to Huvrye before sitting back on the couch with him.

"...Still kinda crazy that you can recover from a wound like that so easily."

Most people would probably be dead, including Leo, if the bullets penetrated his shell.

He accepts the bottle from Leo, shakes two out, and swallows them dry. They won't do much - his system will filter them out pretty quickly - but they should take the edge off for a bit.

"It's a fairy thing," he lies easily. "I didn't realize we were built so much tougher than humans until I accidentally put one through a table in a bar fight."

He's going to need to explain that, and he knows it. He'd rather explain that than why he's so much harder to kill than most people.

"You did what!?"

There is definitely a story here, and Leo wants to hear it. He can't even imagine Huvrye getting into a bar fight, actually, so he's curious how that even happened to begin with.

"Man, how strong are you? When you feel better we should arm wrestle."

Huvrye just shrugs. He'll definitely take that subject change. "It was my first week here. Some drunk human kept trying to grab my wings, and after about the third time I told him off, he took a swing at me. I swung back, and-" He makes a sweeping gesture. "Straight through a table. Security wasn't very happy, but at least they'd seen enough not to kick me out."

He doesn't address the arm wrestling comment. Maybe Leo will forget about it.

He will not forget it.

"Haha, oh man. Sounds like he got what was coming to him, though."

Touching someone when they tell you to stop is a big no-no, don't people know anything about consent!? Leo can imagine he would do the same if some human kept touching his shell after being told to stop. Well, maybe not through the table. Or, maybe. He's never fought a normal, baseline human before.

(Cassandra does not count - Cassandra could crack him like an egg if she wanted to.)

"I guess you could say his turns were tabled." Leo no.

Huvrye shrugs again. "Evidently bouncers are the only people allowed to end fights in bars, so like I said, they weren't happy, and I learned I need to pull my punches against humans."

(So he knew exactly how hard to go against Kevlar. So he knew what it would take to put his would-be kidnappers down. He'd learned early, at least.)

The pun processes for a few long seconds, and then Huvrye shakes his head. Nope.

It's okay, he knows secretly Huvrye thinks he's super funny.

"I don't think every bar has bouncers, so how were you supposed to know?" Then again, it's not like Leo has been in any bars. That party in Sunset Falls has been his only experience with drinking so far. "Anyway, I say if the guy could get up and walk then no harm no foul."

Pause.

"Could he get up and walk?"

Huvrye shrugs - it's not like he frequented bars either. Not a lot of options for a homunculus in Lasardhi.

"He was a little wobbly, but he made it." After the bouncer had woken him up, that was.

"Oh, then, see? It's fiiiine."

So says Leo!

He settles back a bit further on the couch, giving Huvrye another quick once over with his eyes.

"You wanna just... chill and watch tv while we wait for your food?"

The whole thing wasn't really fine in the first place, but Huvrye's not about to belabor the point. He has no idea what happened to that guy regardless.

"Sure." He gestures to the remote. "Go ahead and pick something." He might take a nap while he's waiting for his food, and he's pretty sure he can sleep through whatever Leo chooses.

He would argue that the guy who got shot should get to pick, but he has a feeling that Huvrye doesn't really care, so he turns on the TV and flips through the guide until he finds reruns of an old sitcom.

"Oh, Dad used to watch this sometimes." Not really Leo's thing, but he at least knows the basic plot and characters. It's good enough - nothing likely to be loud or include any upsetting imagery. Like, you know, guns being shot.

They can chill with this until his food gets here.

[Closed] Judged By the Company He Keeps

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