MOVED

The thing about Oswald Cobblepot that most people seem to forget is, if you treat him with some respect, even a modicum, he can be your best friend. Granted, a best friend with a knife behind his back, but the sentiment still stands. With a sigh, he rests his empty glass down on the flat top for Raven to refill. “It’s a wonder you’re alone on a Saturday night and coming to me after hours for a drink.” Still, he motions for Raven to fill whatever order Doll has. “Is there something you want from me? Or just the drink.”

David tips his head lazily to the wall socket where the FROG usually sits. Sluggish, his memory works backward. “Last time was–” David CLICKS his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “I was, uhm–” He’d been with Benny, hadn’t he? “Maybe two days ago, three–” David lets his fingers CRAWL across his stomach and twist between the stripes of his shirt. Over worn and rarely laundered as it is, David remembers wearing it the last time he’d seen the frog.

Still– “I dunno,” he decides. Anxiety tugs at the corners of his mouth, first down, then up in a fleeting, FORGETFUL smile. “Ben– Benny hid it, or Philly– found it, don’t– don’t worry about it, I’m sure it’ll–” David’s kneecaps crack together as he closes his legs and reaches longingly for Sherlock. He leans forward, eyes on Sherlock’s navel while he grasps their shirt, their hips, their thighs, and URGES them to straddle his lap.

     “It’ll turn up,” he says, dismissing the drugs as fast as he’d focussed on them when he slips his hands up under Sherlock’s skirt. It occurs to David that Sherlock and the drugs are EQUAL parts hallucination, both inevitable aspects of this same recurring dream, and priority doesn’t much matter in the face of a psychological GUARANTEE.

Some might get WHIPLASH at David’s shifting focus, but Sherlock has long since learned to ride the roller coaster of it all. Roll with the punches. He’s exciting in his mania, and he pulls them from the DEPTHS of their depression better than any pill has ever been able to. His hands are warm and his eyes hungry. They don’t hesitate to fall forward into his gravitational pull.

One hand slides encouragingly through slightly greasy hair, the other setting the bag down gingerly before they can LOSE it. His hair reminds them that they’ll have to drag him into the shower with them before they leave. Serves the purpose of saving them a frigid one at their GRIMY motel later, and gets David on track for some kind of self-care. Even if it is in the guise of another round.

David extends his index finger against his lips, and releases the imposed mental block. It’s the longest he’s held one over anyone, let alone a mutant, let alone a spy, and letting go is a rush he hasn’t felt since his days as a junkie. Suppressed perception SURGES back over both of them. David relaxes a barrier in his mind and projects all of the calm and assurance he can, plus the message he’d rehearsed: You want to hear what I have to say.

It’s not quite mind control, however much the CIA wants it to be. What he can do to someone’s thoughts is much closer to SUBLIMINAL messaging or the power of suggestion than actual, bonafide mind control. The CIA eggheads had given him lesson after lesson in neurolinguistic programming practices, and SOMEHOW those hours spent reading and observing had done more to help David conceptualize his abilities than any of Melanie Bird’s talk and memory work. Sure, he’s still more weapon than anything, but at least there’s no PRETEXT.

     “C’mon,” David mutters, indicating the alley over his shoulder he’d picked for this little, long awaited conversation. He can almost TASTE his ticket home. I’m not going to hurt you, he says directly to the rogue’s mind. Let’s just talk – mutant to mutant.

They hold no illusions that ANYONE will let them live after the mess they’ve made of their mission- least of all a mutant as powerful as the one calmly requesting their audience in a back alley. Was he sent by Mycroft? By someone else? There’s only SO MUCH they can read off of him, but at least his intentions seem genuine. Mycroft didn’t know they could detect lies now-  he wouldn’t have known enough to train someone to get around it.

And yet, the strangling grip of PARANOIA doesn’t let up. Doll looks around carefully; no one else has noticed them together. They pull their arm from his grip indignantly, but nod in agreement as they think of all the ways this could go wrong.

i think i must be crazy, but my string snapped. i had a relapse- a SUBURBAN RELAPSE.

headcanon: alias roots

One of the traditions/subcultures that Sherlock comes out of is punk music, specifically the sector within punk that shares an edge with the glam rock scene. In the 70s, a band called THE NEW YORK DOLLS rose to brief but very prominent fame. The members of the band were known for being the dudes that dressed like girls: makeup, heels, the whole nine yards. It was because of this that punk boys who dressed feminine came to be known as new york dolls within the scene.

“I don’t suppose that the idea of an establishment being closed carries much weight with you.” The Penguin is nothing if not perceptive. Even with what’s left of the lingering staff, he can tell when someone who’s not supposed to be in his Lounge… is. He affords Doll a look, eyes almost looking past them and not at them. “Come for a drink?”

@suburbanrelapse || gets a thing bc I said.

     “It’s not his,” David says, playing mental interpreter as a list of excuses rolls through the disgusting man’s head. “He FOUND it, he confiscated it from a guest, he– sorry, you what? Flounder louder, I can’t hear the bullshit over the panic.” After compelling the laptop to SHUT with such force the screen shatters, David decides to go all in. The owner’s desk does a complete somersault before it SPLINTERS against the wall. From the wreck, David constructs a chair for himself, pieces of composite wood reassembling in midair as if by magic. The motel owner’s heart rate is so high by the time David settles the back of the chair right up against his, the owner’s, knees, David consider’s upping the bet from soiled slacks to a STROKE.

David flicks the ash from the end of his cigarette, sidles CASUALLY over to the motel owner, and straddles the seat he’d made. Propping his elbows on the chair back digs the slatted wood into the man’s knees, and David, as if seeking APPROVAL, glances up at Dollface while the man whimpers, his fat neck shivering against the blade of Doll’s knife.

As FASCINATING as David’s powers are, Dollface is actually more focused on their malice for the man under their knife than on their lover’s show of telekinetic prowess. They take note of it though, quietly impressed with it all. They could ask the man if he REPORTED the guest to the police, but what does it matter if he turned in the rapist? His watching the video was just as bad as the one who filmed it. They catch David’s gaze with a smirk before they begin to speak.

They don’t FLINCH as he grabs them, proud and defiant as always. But as they observe a flat appearance to his eyes, theirs widen in shock and just the slightest pinch of FEAR. They pull themself away from his grip quickly. But he softens, back to their David, and they gloss over it. Tell themself it was a trick of the light. Their sight is a STRANGE and complex problem anyway. “First- I never said WE were scum. Second, she didn’t speak English. Might have not even been legal- we’re right down on the border now. You think someone like that, someone who just wants to QUIETLY live their life, is going to get the cops involved?”