make friends with your sleep paralysis demon.

{chay suede, 29, cis man, he/him/his} || rômulo cardoso is a mutant with the ability of bogeyman physiology. they’ve been in new york for twenty-nine years where they spend most of their time as a bartender at the honey trap & drug dealer. when i think of them, i think of waking up before the sun has risen, tied up shoes hanging from a power line, laughter echoing across an empty parking lot. they are affiliated with the brotherhood. [eli, 24, she/her/hers, gmt-3] 

Mari wipes sweat from her brow, aimlessly tossing the wraps around her wrist on the stolen gym mats she had set up in the headquarters as she went. Between all the new recruits since going public, and those who just wanted to learn combat, there was seldom a day that went by without Mari throwing around a few punches with someone. Her body was taking the brunt of it beyond bruised arms, legs, and knees, she was just sore. Not that it was the end of the world, but thirty was encroaching on her far too quickly for her taste, and she needed some sort of distraction from the matter as soon as possible. Possibly in the form of alcohol to take the edge of the ache she felt. 

That’s when she spots her unfortunate victim of reclaiming her youth: Rome. He had been putting up with her for years at this point, he should be used to it, but Mari was hardly concerned with chasing him off. It had been well over a decade by now, if he was going to cut her out, it would have happened by now. On the contrary, Rômulo had become something like a brother to her long ago. Especially when she had ended up alone in the world. Rome’s Tía’s apartment had become a bit of a safe haven as she struggled to find a place to live. She always tried her best not to over stay her welcome, but she spent more than a few nights on their couch until she scrounged up a job and enough money to get a place of her own. So, if Rome had intended to get rid of her, he had missed his opportunity. 

“Rome,” Mari calls, pulling a t-shirt over her head as she approaches, “Whose turn is it to pay for lunch? I’ve worked up an appetite,” She says, dramatically showing off her bicep for good measure. Mostly to poke at him to see just how much she was able to push the envelope of being obnoxious today.

@romecardoso​​

Rômulo's days are often eerily free in broad daylight -- which would explain why he sometimes can be found terrorising people for fun out of boredom. His income is divided between dealing illegal substances and working as a bartender at a strip club, both of which are primarily night time activities. Occasionally he has to set something up at the bar, or make a delivery that takes up his afternoon, but for the most part, he just finds things to keep himself busy. He helps his Tia most mornings, he goes to the gym, he cleans up his place, etcetera. 

Bothering Mari is just one of the many things he chooses to do on empty days. It keeps the spirit of their friendship alive, of course, to be constantly keeping up the act of being annoyed by her while also actively reaching out to talk. Most days, she feels more like a sister than a friend, but he's not sentimental enough to say that out loud. They both know it, though. It'd be a disservice to their history to ignore how growing up together had connected them and cemented the kinship between them. Even Tia Esperança had taken a liking to Mari when they were still kids, which is a feat, considering the old lady doesn't like that many people.

"It is your turn, because you still owe me for the time I paid for drinks," he says in greeting (an absolute lie, she has already paid him back for that weeks ago), lips pulling into a smile as he approaches. "What, this old thing? Are you trying to scare me?" Rome pokes at her flexed bicep. "Looks like my arm when I'm not wearing my human mask. Little twig arms. Cute."

The club has become such a second home to Rômulo, that he forgets a strip club can be considered something so taboo. The pounding music has become background white noise to him, the dancers are nothing more than incredible professionals doing their job, he's no more entertained than if he were watching a bunch of dentists perform root canals on the floor. And for the most part, customers are regular patrons who show up often enough that they, too, feel like they own the place. Then there's also the odd kid or two that walks into the door, clearly seeing a half-naked body for the first time in real life, and Rome makes sure to check their IDs a dozen times before he serves them. Then there's the guy that walks in tonight.

He stands out like a sore thumb, if only because something about his demeanour screams uncomfortable. Rômulo has a good eye for this sort of thing, so when he squints at the man to get a good look, familiarity hits him. He remembers that face -- a uniform, chaos, a lot of yelling. He was the paramedic. Several weeks ago, some stupid little human had decided they could take more of a dose than they should, and when Rome stopped by to collect his payment, he found his client unconscious. Calling an ambulance had been the right thing to do, which he did (begrudgingly) only because saving this idiot meant he didn't have to lose a client. It was a funny coincidence that the same paramedic who answered that call would end up here -- too big of a coincidence, perhaps, to be true.

He makes sure to slide right towards the familiar stranger, as soon as he reaches the bar. "So we meet again," he greets, neutral. He's unsure of what this encounter will shape up to be -- if the paramedic is here to give him shit about that client, Rome will have to scare him off. "The city's feeling pretty small tonight, huh."

@romecardoso​

Nobody could ever mistake Tiffany for someone  tough, but she does have occasional moments of chutzpah. It’s a necessary part of the job: she’s learned not to let people intimidate her. It’s like, every other day someone’s doing something shady at the motel. Another guest had reported several different, shifty looking people going in and out of one of the rooms, and Tiff sighs before making her way up there. Actually she’s kind of annoyed.

“Excuse me! Hello!” She knocks on the door with surprising briskness, her usually soft voice turned unhesitating. This job sucks enough as it is, she doesn’t need someone encouraging a bunch of addicts to traipse around the corridors.

Unsurprisingly, the local motel is a perfect spot to do some suspicious tradings. His clients are happier meeting at a random place than having him know where they live (smart of them), and he sure as hell isn't letting people come to his place (safe of him), so there always has to be a middle ground. It's a win-win, he adds the fee of the room into the price of the happy pills as a little extra, and he doesn't even lose any money for it.

Too good to be true, he thinks bitterly, when there's a sudden knock on the door from a voice that sounds authoritative. The face that comes with it, however, is anything but. He opens the door and is surprised to see the little girl from the desk, to which he raises a brow and leans against the doorframe lazily. "I could be buttnaked right now and doing some really crazy shit. Weird choice to interrupt a guest like this." He peeks over her shoulder, feels relieved that he doesn't see his next buyer anywhere near. "What is it, dollface?"

18th April, 1998; some time after midnight || @romecardoso​​

After he and Riley had moved to New York City roughly seven years ago, Levi had taken to the big city atmosphere like a fish to water — but there were still some places, like the Honey Trap ( or the Veil, if he was trying to track down Samson ), that left him feeling out of his depth. With Riley in his life he’d never had to bother putting too strict a label to his own sexuality, so stepping through the doors of the club to see a woman wearing a generous handful of sequins and not much else, all Levi could really say was this wasn’t it. 

Fortunately, that wasn’t why he was here. He bypasses the stages entirely and beelines for the bar, snagging his preferred seat at the far end where he can put his back to the wall. It’s busy, naturally, so Levi doesn’t bother to be pushy; he waits until he can catch Rômulo’s eyes, then raises eyebrows and smiles, lightly waggling his gloved fingers as a hello.

x

The Honey Trap already felt like a second home to him. Granted, Rômulo was sort of a parasite, the embodiment of the act of manspreading, you leave him long enough anywhere and he'll make a home out of it. Here, at the bar, there's nothing to dislike. The lights are low behind the counter, and blinding towards the stages, the customers are usually drunk and eager enough to see the dancers that they hardly give him any trouble, and it's a solid spot to find stupid humans looking to buy the illegal substances tucked into his pockets. It's easy money all around.

The place is made considerably better on nights like tonight, when a welcome face stops by to entertain him. Rome fills up another glass of beer and pushes out two shots of a deadly bright green liquid before he can make his way to lean across from Levi, throwing a hand towel over his own shoulder. "Finally, someone to save me from hearing about George's beloved wife all night again," he greets, hearing the regular patron George in question protest from the distance with a wounded hey. He lifts a hand towards the man, apologetic, before his voice lowers in a conspiratorial murmur towards Levi. "Comes here every night, feels guilty about leaving the missus at home. Absolute dickass." He snorts. "Good to see you, though. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

@c23tasks​

[TW: under the cut there is a gif of the creepy dude from pan's labyrinth. courtesy of cola.]

what’s your mutant’s ability? (if you need help finding a proper definition or just a resource for abilities, you can head over here. i recommend that you also link the page on your post when you find the ability you were looking for!)

Rome's ability is bogeyman physiology.

what’s your mutant’s classification level? (you can choose it here.)

Alpha

how old were they when they first discovered their abilities? how did it happen?

It first showed up when he was really young, before he can remember it. By the time he was a toddler, he was unable to control himself and was terrorising his parents left and right, becoming monsters that were much bigger, much louder than their angelic three-year-old baby.