#toonsupe

It was a good balance of isolation and socialization. For the first year or so (especially while her body was detoxing and she was going through withdrawals) she isolated herself. She couldn't tell vision from hallucination or nightmare from reality. The withdrawals made things just as bad as the substances had.

She remembers her doctor really well, Dr. Dennis May. He was a blonde middle-aged man with a soft face and a gentle smile and crystal clear blue eyes. He was very patient with her. It was his idea to put a piano in the recreation room to help Lucy with her recovery. Once she had access to that, she started to become more social with other patients as well as staff. She didn't really get to know any of them very well and there are a few who stand out in her memories for various reasons, but she never got close to any of them.

this is how rabbits must feel when they're staring right at a wolf's mouth, a simple-minded creature that has no concept of dying, but is afraid of it anyway— hughie feels his heartbeat on his neck, a jittery thing like a knot that does not keep his breathing from jumping, and the whole thing could be absolutely ridiculous if he stopped to think about it for more than a second : he had insisted, really, because being prepared against a supe was the smart thing to do, and learning some fighting skills had been on his list ever since he'd joined butcher and his weird little band, but perhaps he should've started with an easier subject. he imagines kimiko would have been less than thrilled but she'd accept anyway, and a practiced fight with annie probably would end up as anything except that— but at least the two of them didn't inspire such a base, earnest terror from him when all was said and done.

noir is not going to kill him, hughie is aware of this— if the man wanted him gone, there is no doubt in his mind that he would be gone and there was nothing anyone could do about it. it doesn't mean that, beyond the drawings and the amicable moments of quiet among them that hughie wants very bad to consider bonding, black noir does not remain to be the most terrifying of the seven's supes. it's the mask, he concludes, it has to be. hughie struggles for a scary few seconds with the fact that this would be it, that everything he's fought so hard for is about to be for nothing because you cannot play pretend with a supe, much less someone as dangerous as noir.

She takes the flowers softly, tenderly. They smell like iron, like conflict, tinged with adrenaline. Yes, adrenaline. Odorless to most, but not to her. She knows the chemical composition of the mortal body, and she can taste the raised spike of adrenaline that comes when a mortal sees their death coming, but can not avoid it.

    “You’re very kind, my love.” Lifting the flowers up to her nose, she paid no attention to the few drops of essence that stain her blouse and on down to her shoes. She took a warm, eye-closing sniff, and she smiled. 

it is this passion ( can a taste for blood be considered passion? perhaps, it is simply sadism that drives him ) that pushes him forward, brings him steps closer to the heart of vaught. when he finally holds that heart in his hands, he will be the one to plunge a sword through it. no matter the costs, he will take down the organization. if not for himself then for his mother, for his grandfather.

these are the racing thoughts that burn the boy's psyche as he surges forward, lays eyes on a frame he has only ever seen on television, in broadcasts & movies about how wonderful & grand superhuman heroes are. he almost cannot believe his own vision, blinks as to clear sleep from his eyes. there he is, alone: the quiet one, black noir.

this is it --- the opening into the seven that damian has dreamt of, spent every night falling asleep to the idea of. the boy, clad in his dark robes, slips into the shadows. from here with his back flush against the concrete wall, he observes. he trails behind the frame of the "great" superhero as he goes about his day, slipping from shadow to shadow. when he gets too close, he simply re-positions himself to above, giving the boy an excuse to scale stout buildings, footprints streaked down otherwise clean windows.

from here, he waits. an opportunity will present itself, noir will find them somewhere quiet, he is certain.

"I can't promise you that I'll be 'round forever," she says, feeling the weight of the words as they settle into the air when she pauses for a moment, before she lifts her head. Lips curved just slightly into the faintest of grins, as much as to hold up a middle finger to the world because this is the part that's important, this is the part that matters. "But if there's one thing I know it's that we're good together."

TARGET   :   BLACK NOIR. LOCATION   :   @toonsupe​​​ ASSIGNMENT   :   otherwise prompted. ENCRYPTED   :     character death﹕ receiver  faces  the  aftermath  of  sender’s  death .

        well   ...   she did it.her chest is heaving, her body aches in ways she doesn’t think it should, considering pain was one of the first things vought stole from her, she’s battered, bloodied. for someone so dead inside, noir certainly had wanted to live   ---   but he’d underestimated one thing. just how badly she’d wanted him dead, how that desire would push her to see his head separated from his body. ideally, she’d wanted to torture him, wanted to make him really fucking hurt. make him understand how it felt, how she’s felt all these years, what he took from her when he took artemiy   ---   or at least a fraction of it. no one could understand how grief ripped through her and took everything with it, leaving her completely empty with nothing but her righteous fury. her brother, her real brother, had been the first person to care, to really care. not like a-train, not like noir’s lukewarm attachment. artemiy would’ve left with her. artemity would’ve done anything for her and vought took him. she’d been content to live her happy life, but they wanted to disturb her? call upon her wrath? fine.

        her back is pressed against the wall. the whole damn place is a mess. walls crumbled, anything either could get their hands on thrown, broken. she thinks, bitterly, what a perfect fucking metaphor it all is, their shared ability to destroy anything they touch. the difference is she wanted to be more   ---   he didn’t. 

      his body is sprawled   ...   somewhere, posed like a ball - jointed doll fallen from its shelf. his head lays maybe a foot away from her. she can see it through the gap between her knees. another moment is spent catching her breath, feeling her bones and guts shifting back into place, before she stands. picks up the head before peeling the mask off. she just needs to see, a curiosity that had never been satiated in his waking days. there’s no reaction to what she sees. she doesn’t think she would’ve reacted no matter what was under there, she just had to know. she doesn’t know why.

        his head gets wrapped up neatly and tucked into a colorful cardboard box. she even puts a ribbon around it and a tag, addressed to stan edgar and the seven.

∗ o5﹕ sender  comforts  receiver  in  the  aftermath  of  a  nightmare

Her nightmares always did seem to be the same; based off memories from her time in the battlefield, debris all about, bullets scattering across the field, bodies laid askewn. It catches her off guard when she feels a pressure to her shoulder from a hand, her own reaching under her pillow to withdraw the black pistol beneath, swift to aim it at - 

Not Bouncer awakening her (he’s grown to understand that sometimes, allowing her to make it through the nightmare as more simplistic then awakening her), but something that one like this guest wouldn’t know.

“Shit, Noir. . .what - what the h*ll are you doing here? How did you get in my apartment?”