2019-09-26 - Surf, Sand, And Knowledge Bombs

"GET THE FUCK BACK! GET THE FUUUCK AWAY! DON'T TOUCH ME! I KNOW WHAT I SAW! FUCK YOU, BITCH!"

A young man with a GoPro attached to his head screams at a blonde lady, both of them under the boardwalk. He holds a knife at her, his hand shaking, as he seems quite out of it.

"THERE'S SOME WEIRD SHIT GOING ON HERE," he screams to the crowd around him, all of them begging him not to do anything rash and backing away when he slashes at the air. "THERE'S SOMETHING FU-"

That is all the alarmist teen live on Twitch gets before a flying mixed race woman appears out of the blue to dig her heel into his side in a brutal kick. The barely-a-man streamer rolls clinging to his side, grimacing and hissing in pure agony.

Soon said Chinese-American puts a knee on his back, and yanks his arms back. "No patience for your kind of shit today, partner," she mumbles as handcuffs go around his wrist. The boy is hoisted up to his feet, Sarah is left to talk to the young woman, as Tessa takes the liver shot boy to some local patrol as he barfs on himself out of pain.

All said and done, Tessa approaches Sarah back with her frown to get her donut from the blonde detective, chewing on it. "So, you said that friend of yours of the psychopathic persuasion would be showing up. Just a warning, not putting up with -any- of that shit today, Stevens."

Foul mood and it is just morning!

At some point, Alexander gets over the death flu, and the less said about that, the better. At some point, he also gets over the desire to murder anyone who vaguely annoys him, which means he's released from August's home and gets to return to his own place and try to start putting his life back into some pretend version of normal again.

Part of which, at least for him, means meeting cops at the ocean. He's lost about ten pounds from the flu, his face gone a bit ragged and gaunt, and he still moves like a man twenty years older as the last of the muscle and joint aches are shaken out of his body. His green army jacket swallows him, and he huddles in it as he walks towards the arranged meeting point. His days of looking like a diseased homeless person are coming to a middle, to be sure.

On the bright side, he got called to talk with cops, and that always puts him in a pretty good mood. He watches the shouter be carted away, the issue handled well without any intervention of the mind-invadey kind needed, so there's a brief smile on his haggard features as he approaches the partners. "Detectives." His voice is still a bit hoarse and gravely, contributing to the general 'unwell hobo' vibe, but he's too tired to be his usual level of twitchy and paranoid. "Hope you're both well."

There exist in this world three types of people. Some are like Sarah, known as Morning People. She rises out of bed bright and early, just before the sun crops up to get a little exercise in. She hums and does bad renditions of pop culture songs in the shower. She does a bit of light yoga on the deck of her Catamaran, catching the first rays of the sun for some Vitamin D. Then she drinks her coffee and downs a power bar and some granola on her way to work.

Then there are the people who drag ass until a certain point. Maybe it's when they're in the shower, or after they've eaten breakfast. Some aren't 'awake' until after coffee. Others take until noon to reach that point. They are grump and angry at anything that comes near them and requires thought to solve.

And finally, there's Tess. Tess woke up grumpy one day and never left it.

Sarah is busy comforting her fellow blonde NPC, rubbing the woman's back and arms and telling her that things are going to be okay now. They got him, he isn't going to hurt her. No, they aren't going to hurt him (anymore), either. It's for his own safety, yada yada. It does the trick and makes the woman less hysterical as the man is drug off to be arrested by the Booty Patrol (Sarah's pet name for the beach cops who wear shorts).

The detective is wearing her wetsuit today, her hair stringy and dripping, a black and gray sharkskin affair made of thick, warm material because it is Autumn and it is kind of cold AF. It clings, it pads, and it keeps her from hypothermia while out catching waves. Her surfboard is lying waaaaaaay over theeeeeere, where she'd dropped it when the fracas started.

Because look, she wasn't having meetings at the beach and not getting wet. Not until winter hit hard, anyway.

"It'll be fine, Chen. He's not a psycho, he's just... kind of a lunatic with some hair triggers. You do Bruce Lee kicks at people with knives. He does... weird mind shit when people laugh. You're basically the same person!"

Sure, she caught the Death Flu and all the really weird shit that entailed. But healthy living at least makes her recovery short and sweet, even if she still had a bit of an ache deep in her bones.

The two women are soon spying Alexander, and the blonde makes her way out onto the rock-strewn beach to meet him, her aqua-socks with the individual toes protecting her feet. A shark-gloved hand socks the male lightly in the arm as she flashes him a grin.

"Look at you! Wow. Just wow." Sarah grins at Tess, then back to Alexander. "You are looking so great. Did you lose weight? Right on. I've been trying, but, y'know, it just sticks around! Hahahaha ah... So you find anything out about the Krugers?"

'You are basically the same person' gets the expected reaction from Tessa Chen, and she simply ignores Sarah's comment instead of arguing it. She is in a (relative) good mood today, thanks to having kicked someone very hard on the liver. That is the sort of person she is, always happy to dish out violence.

As Alexander approaches, however, Tessa eyes him warily. As a greeting, she just checks out her gun, for no reason, really. It is not like there will be any telepathy going on in the beach, those things do not happen.

While Sarah goes talking about weight, Tessa is behind her rolling her eyes and groaning. Tessa doesn't do small talk, Tessa doesn't text. She is about to intervene when Sarah finally gets to the Kruegers, and that is when she steps closer and stares at Alexander. The information he has better have been worth her awakening to a world of (even more) shit where mind magic is real.

Alexander sidesteps the sock on the arm with an exasperated sort of look at Sarah. "Please don't touch me," he reminds her, although without any noticeable irritation. He knows his thing about touching is weird. And he's too tired to work up a good panic attack or mad about it, anyway. He stares back at Tessa, although he looks more guilty than anything. "Sorry," he mutters to her. Whether she realizes what he's apologizing for or not is up in the air.

Either way, he turns back to Sarah and shakes his head. "Nothing of substance. I'm sorry. It's been a...rough couple of weeks." A deep breath. "I was going to try to interview Elise Krueger, but my illness interfered." It's the only acknowledgement he gives to the quips about his weight. "Judging by the tape evidence from the hospital, it wasn't in any way personal towards the Kruegers. It still doesn't feel right for killing a couple of debtors, and it doesn't seem a great way to transfer ownership to Elise, either. She could have ordered the hit through her boyfriend, maybe. But I've never heard any gossip about them having a strained relationship." He rubs wearily at his head. "I'm sorry. I'd have liked to have more for you, but things have been...hectic."

Tess checking out her gun is just one of those things Sarah pretends not to notice while putting up her aura of good humor. She is the Good Cop in this routine, all smiles, super buddy-buddy. Very friendly. Much jokes. Wow.

Still, the murders is the least of what the blonde wants to talk about... but it's still her job, so she might as well ask. She did bring Alexander into this investigation. It's her ass on the line if he, as previously quoted, 'fucks her.'

"Right, right, I forget." The blonde's smile doesn't even waver, her dimples holding strong as she holds up her hands in surrender and leans back on her heels. She drops them a moment later. "You afraid of all women, or is it just me? I mean, I get it. I'm pretty intimidating. Just ask Chen here. I kick her ass at the gym all the time." She doesn't.

"No shit, you caught the bug, too? Man, I was hallucinating so bad I couldn't even SLEEP! Haha... fuck. It was rough. Anyway..." The smile finally fades as the wetsuit-wearing woman folds her arms under her chest, cocking a hip. "Yeah, we pulled their phone records, checked their texts. But someone doesn't need to be mad at you to kill you for money. She isn't selling the motel, at least not yet. But that doesn't mean anything. It could even be a scheme the boyfriend cooked up all on his own, too. Judging by his rap sheet, he doesn't seem very bright. Elise is up next on our docket, too."

"All right, so the only thing for you is I got a couple of rooks running around doing some of the legwork for us. Haven and Reid. If you run into them, cooperate. That's the deal. We bring you in, you keep us in the loop and assist our assistants if you cross paths."

She glances towards Tess, trying to get a read on the other woman. Her very own Agent Scully to her Fox Mulder. "There's that... other thing I'd like to discuss, too."

The thing about apologies is that on one hand, Tessa was raised to be polite and to be a good Christian, kicks to the liver or not, and that forgiveness is a virtue. The issue with that is that the detective REALLY likes to stay mad at people, so it is always a tug 'o war between doing the right thing, and doing the right thing for Tessa.

So she nods, giving Alexander some forgiveness probation. If he can walk the line, Tessa might be able to forget all about that in a week or fifty years. Either or.

When Alexander comes up with nothing, Tessa eyes Sarah, eyebrows arched. She fully expects the sunny detective to pull something out of her hat and somehow make evidence show up out of thin air. Tessa needs a shoot out fast, all this standing and talking making the hot-blooded woman feel stiffled.

GOD it felt good to feel that milenial's squishy guts compress under her boot. He was SO soft! Tessa smiles some, but her briefly distant gaze tells it is nothing about what they are talking about, and more like something she is daydreaming of.

She folds her arms when looked at, arching her brow. It is obvious she is not really up to discuss anything involving her own insane moment in the sea, but Chen is also not one to back down of anything. If that is the talk they are having, that is the talk they are having.

"Do not pull any of your bullshit on the rookies."

"Be careful about that," Alexander says, quietly. "How you push, I mean." He nods to the rooks. "I was at the briefing. I'm aware of Officer Haven, although I don't think I've spoken to her much. The other one is an outsider." Which he doesn't trust as well as he does townies, that's clear. He gives Tessa a sidelong look, sighs, then nods. "I try not to, in general."

Sarah gets a dubious look. "Are you sure that's a conversation you want to have?" A glance back at Tessa, then to Sarah. "It went so well, last time."

"How I push what? The investigation? Because of Monaghan? We know the boyfriend works for him. Because shitty people gravitate to other shitty people. Doesn't mean I don't have to kick over those rocks and look at what crawls out."

Sarah must be one of those bleeding heart types who still believes in The System. She lifts both of her shoulders in a shrug, quirking her lips to the side in a 'What can I do?' sort of way.

Then she looks at Tess when Alexander does. "Weeeeeeeell... Not 'want'. So much as 'need'. I'm sure my totally amazing partner can keep her chortling to herself, at least until we're out of earshot." A raised eyebrow. "...Right?"

"Look," Blue eyes swing back to Alexander, leaning in a mite closer after scanning the horizon, making sure no eavesdroppers are close enough to ear. "I'm starting to get the feeling that crime is one of the least things this town needs protecting from. And that's my job. Serve and Protect. Believe it or not, there are those of us who take it seriously."

"A while back, after we talked, I was talking with someone. I told them what happened. She asked me to try and do something. I did. Or I guess I did. She felt it. Then she did something, and I felt that. So this shit is real, or I'm still in my fever dream. So tell me about Dimension X and the Dolores Oranges already."

"Because I'm pretty sure I went there when I was laid up. I mean, maybe. It was... I was pretty sure I was asleep. But I remember everything. I felt everything."

Let it be known that in this day, Alexander and Tessa agree. She nods when he asks Sarah if this is a conversation she wants to have. The Chinese-American for sure doesn't care for it.

She remains suspiciously non-responsive as asked if she can keep her chortle to herself, and instead pays attention to what Sarah is saying. Tessa narrows her eyes. She doesn't think all of that sounds as stupid as it did the week before, and that is highly upsetting. She eyes the two of them, and as the only muggle around, has no experiences to recount other than Alexander's mind attack.

"What is causing this?" And how do we kill it remains implicit. Tessa will find a way to kill it. For now, however, she just remains with her arms folded, lips thinned into a line. Everyone in this fucking town seems to have some strange power that the Texan is completely oblivious to.

Highly upsetting stuff.

"If this is real, how do we fight against it?" She doesn't want to expand it, learn more about the implications of magic in the cure of cancer, or how magical Sarah's dreams are. She wants that shit gone!

Alexander rubs the back of his neck. "Because, Detective, looking at the pattern of failed prosecutions over the years against Monaghan and his associates, I'm reasonably certain a good number of your fellow officers and members of local government are bought and paid for by him, and it's not thugs in the dark you have to worry about so much as your own fellow officers. Whatever you do with Monaghan, go slow, go careful, and cover your ass. If you take it seriously. And if you want to also continue to have a career."

He also, after a moment, circles back to something said a while ago. "And I'm not afraid of women. Or men. I just don't like to be touched." Maybe it's prompted by her leaning in closer. He doesn't lean away, but does sort of hunch a little more, like he's trying to project a bubble. He listens to Sarah's explorations with raised eyebrows. "Yes. You have the potential. I told you that. You're weak and untrained...at least in what I can do. But you stand out."

As she continues, he sighs. "Yeah. We've been theorizing that this bug, whatever the fuck it is, came from Over There. Some of the nightmares were," he sighs, "unusual. And it fucked up my abilities. They're still recovering," he admits. "Regular illnesses don't do that." A pause. "Um. What exactly do you want to know? It's mostly terra incognita. Some people call it the Veil, which strikes me as imprecise, since it's a place, not a barrier or border, but think of it as an alternate dimension that sort of kinda correlates to our world. Like - there's a Gray Harbor over there, but it's different. A City Hall with Departments of Hauntings, and typing pools overseen by a pair of severed feet with mouths on the ends of its toes. It's not...a thing you can explain without sounding crazy."

A smile flickers to life at Tessa's questions. "No idea," he tells her, with a shrug. "Things from over there have been torturing me since I was six or so. If I could slam the doors shut, I would. Not all of it is evil - I'm not sure any of it is evil as we understand the term; morality is a human construct, and what's there is definitely not human. But some of it is dangerous. Especially what...I call the dolorphages. They feed on negative human emotions, I think. Particularly for those of us who stand out. You," a nod to Tessa, "are probably pretty safe from them. If it makes you feel better. And if you do end up getting lost, if you survive, you probably won't even remember what happened. Not what really happened. It's not really your fight." He probably doesn't mean to sound as condescending as he just sounded. It doesn't stop it from being that condescending, though.

As Tessa rails against the night, looking more and more unhappy with every syllable that comes out of the two True Believer's mouths, Sarah reaches over to lay a hand on the back of her shoulder and give her a little up-and-down rub real quick. There, there, Muggle. Everything will be okay. Surely this doesn't mean you're the last sane person in the universe.

"Yeah, dirty cops. I get that. I suspected that was why at least of the cases remained unsolved, or pinned an obvious patsy. If you got names, I want them. I want to know who's on my side when the shooting starts and who's aiming at my back."

Sarah's lips form a thin little line and she looks down at the news that she's weak and untrained. She thought she'd done pretty damned good! "Just how damned Charles Xavier ARE you, then?"

Talk turns to the famed Dimension X, and every word of it has the blonde frowning. It's an unusual thing to see on her face, unless she's ready to pull her gun on someone or beat them down. She prefers the Good Cop routine to the Royal Beatdown. Still, it's there, her brows lowered. She's trying to keep an open mind, but even she can't quite tell if mouths on the end of severed feet toes is just her being fucked with.

There's a glance towards the Chinese-American cop to make sure she's not about to break into giggle-fits.

"Dolorphages." Sarah repeats, so she doesn't keep having to call them other ridiculous names. She'll probably forget it again soon enough, anyway. "Right. I think it's all our fight. Everyone who knows, whether they can remember or see or not. So how come not everyone can see it? How come I can see a corpse that looks like it got shoved through a paper shredder and know that's really fucking weird, and other people just shrug and go 'Eh! Mountain lions. What'cha gonna do?'" Her mockup of a generic civilian voice drops a few octaves lower and sounds dopey as Hell.

"What makes you and me have this... 'potential'?"

Tessa listens about Force corruptio and she doesn't add much. She main listens, even if she gets visibly more upset. She doesn't go into it, but for a while there, the conversation sees her nodding and agreeing with much being said. It is only at the end that she adds something.

"This is higher up corruption. The rookies are the less likely to be in it," she says, and then resumes to being quiet.

Good thing, too, because what is said next makes the woman want to quit her job and leave the city. Hauntings, supernatural and people with potential or not. Suddenly her skills, hard earned skills at that, don't seem to matter much. She is not chosen. She is just another ignorant asshole, no better than those sovereign citizens she stopped in traffic every now and then.

'It is not your fight.'

"I make things my fights, not the other way 'round." And just like that, it is her fight. Still, she understands where he is coming from. She will keep forgetting about these things. There is a look given to Sarah as the woman goes on, talking about her potential and superpowers.

She eyeballs the car, far off in the distance, but she stays for the time being, paying attention to learn as she can.

Alexander eyes Sarah. "Uh. Yeah. I sort of like not being killed in a routine traffic stop," he doesn't even have a car, "so I'd rather not hand over names of people who I suspect to be dirty cops. I don't know you near well enough for that. As for your other question," he chuckles, suddenly. "I'm not a telepath. I can't reach into your mind and get your computer passwords, or rewrite your past history, or things like that. I guess you'd call me an empath, if you were putting a name to it, but it does encompass more than that." He shrugs. "I can feel what other people are feeling. Whether they think they're telling the truth or not. I can make people feel things." A sidelong look to Tessa, again. "I can induce hallucinations across all five senses. There's others, but those are the big ones."

He starts to pace on the sand. "And I don't know. Why we are the way we are. There's maybe something with two prominent families - the Addingtons and the Baxters - with a lot of people who stand out in them, but is it genetics? Some sort of forgotten bargain? Exposure at critical moments to a catalyzing agent? I don't know. Some people don't stand out, and then they do. Some people stand out from an early age. And people who don't stand out usually just don't see things. And you can't record them. Try to take a picture of a guy juggling fruit with his mind, and it won't ever come out right. Is that a deliberate action by some sort of guiding force, or just a hidden law of physics we don't understand? I don't know."

He turns and regards Tessa, thoughtfully. "All right," he says, at last. "It's not a bad thing," he adds, after a moment. "That you don't--" he grimaces. "We always know. We can see each other. It's easy to assume that someone who doesn't...stand out, that they don't know anything. Which is an advantage, for you. If you want to use it." A shrug. "If I can help, I will."

Once again, Sarah lays a hand on Tess, this time on top of her shoulder, where her arm joins it, giving a light little squeeze so she doesn't fly off the handle and try to beat names out of the semi-hobo in front of them. And because she feels the way the woman looks at the car. She felt the same way when she started to suspect shit in this town was not as it appeared to be. It took her a year to cope with it and start accepting that people simply couldn't SEE.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, you can tell when people lie? Fuck! That'd make my job so much simpler." The blonde rocks back a little bit at the idea of gaining that power. "Shit, maybe I should find a mutant academy and enroll. What do you think, Chen? Human lie detector? Pretty sweet, right?"

Though something Alexander says takes her off that track. "You can't record anything? So if you punted my surfboard out into the ocean, and I filmed it, not even we'd see it right?" Again a look at Tess. "And if someone walked into a motel and mind-zotted the Krugers, what would the camera see then?"

"Tess will help. Even if we tried to tell her not to. She's a good cop like that. But... what do you mean, 'see each other'. I haven't seen anyone. I can't tell shit, until you did... that thing." That thing which will not be named. "What is it you look for in people who have, well, 'it'?"

Tessa pinches the bridge of her nose. At face value, it all sounds incredibly stupid. She doesn't believe she is here listening to it, but reality, it seems, is closer to comic books than she would have liked. Bargains, genetics, Sarah is talking about mutants, and it all sounds like something she shouldn't be giving her time of the day for.

"So I can't be noticed by you people? Can't you just read my mind and know I am up to something?" Tessa tilts her head, unsure of how effective this so-called advantage of hers is. Still, she adds.

"I got ran out of Houston because of police corruption. I know very well what happens when you dont play ball. I won't ask about your assumptions. I'll just have to start making my own." Because getting ran out of a town once wasn't enough!

"I am already a human lie detector." Truth is simple, everybody is lying all the time. Bam, problem solved. She nods at being called a good cop. Damn right she is.

"Do bullets work on the these things you mentioned? These ghosts that tortured you or something? Or do I need to have fancy mind abilities to do anything about it?"

"You probably just aren't paying the right kind of attention," Alexander tells Sarah, with no tact whatsoever. "How we see each other is always different, but it's always there, once you start picking it out. And you can sort of feel if people can do the same kinda things you can do, whether they're stronger or weaker than you are. For me, it's just that some people stand out. If the world were a movie, they'd be in focus in the camera lens, and the rest of the world would be just a tiny bit out of focus."

He turns to look at Sarah's surfboard. "I couldn't punt your surfboard except by picking it up and tossing it, and a camera would record that just fine. Most of what I do isn't the sort of thing that could be recorded anyway. But, um, if I could set something on fire with my mind - which I can't - but if I could, and you happened to have a camera pointed at whatever it was, something would happen to the recording, and it wouldn't be possible to tell that the fire was started unconventionally. It might go fuzzy, or skip a frame. Nothing huge. Nothing that says 'psychic coverup here'. Just enough so that anyone looking at it isn't gonna say, 'oh that's proof of pyrokinesis'."

Tessa gets a wary sort of look. "I mean. I see you. Obviously. And I could read your emotions, and it might give me a good idea of what you're up to, depending on the context. But it's not an 'I win' button, and some people have better defenses than others, even if they don't have abilities. Someone who is less skilled than me might not be able to read you at all."

The last, he shakes his head. "The dolorphages? No. I've never seen one. I've never even heard of anyone hurting one, much less killing one. You avoid their attention if you can. You...survive it, if you can't. Being what I am just makes me," he grimaces, "tastier to them. It's not a help."

Sarah just kind of slowly nods. Of course there aren't any easy tricks to this. It's all experience and learning, the old fashioned way. While that makes sense, it also super-duper sucks. She'd much rather take the fast track. That's why she can't be a Jedi, she'd go to the Dark Side.

The explanation of what happens when another uses their fire under surveillance has her brain struggling to wrap around it, as well. She cups an elbow, a finger to her lips, nipping at the end of the fingernail on her index as she glances towards her board that is thankfully neither in flames nor being punted. There's a nod. "Okay. I guess I get it."

"Great, so we got unkillable horror movie monsters," The cinephile cop gripes, scuffing a toe, kicking a bit of sand unhappily at the news. At the apex of her kick, she unwinds her arms, hands sliding high up onto her hips in a defiant glare across the ocean. It makes for a cinematic pose, but the danger isn't coming from across the Pacific. It's already here.

"If I've learned anything from movies, it's that everything has a weakness. It's just a matter of finding it. It doesn't matter if we know how to protect them yet, people are in danger. As a woman, I should just move far the fuck away from here. As a police officer, I have to figure this out. Fuuuuuuuuuuck."

"Hey, thanks guy." The blonde turns, winding up to sock Alexander in the arm again, before peeling off and dropping her arm instead. "Right, right. Bad touches. Me and Chen got work to get to, and you look like you still need some hot soup and bedrest. Try some green tea and yoga, you'll live longer."

As she collects her surfboard, Sarah shoots a finger-gun at the male. "You keep us in the loop, we'll keep you in the loop. Good? Good."

With her surfboard under one arm, the other around Tessa's shoulders, the blonde tugs the brunette away, murmuring something about getting her psychiatric counseling for all these anger issues.