16519/Lover

Lover
Date of Scene:	05 September 2024
Location:	Club Lux, Melville
Synopsis:	A meeting of minds.
Cast of Characters:	Lucifer, Sinister, Spawn

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Lucifer has posed:
Middle of the week nights are slooooow. How slow? The usual bundle of business men and ne'er do wells are in their spots. Watching caged dancers and spending too much of daddy's money on drinks. But the crowd is thin. A scattering of about no more than fifteen to twenty people in the whole bar. Some would dare to wonder why Lucifer keeps it open during the weeknights. Well - business is business - and sometimes he can catch a crowd one way or another.

Tonight's just not that kind of night. Which is fine - considering all the excitement Lucifer's been facing lately? He could use a bit of slow at his club. It also means that he'll let the DJ take a break and moves to sit down at the piano just off center of the dance floor. Fingers dancing over the keys in professional fashion. The man certainly can tickle the ivories.

"At first I was afraid... I was petrified... kept thinking how I'd ever live without you by my side.... but then you spent so many nights thinkin' how you did me wrong and I grew strong...and I learned how to get along..." Okay... the Devil can apparently sing too....

Sinister has posed:
Well, he does have all the best addicts, talents and doomed artists in his domain -- and probably a few that sold thier souls for a brass trumpet, on the road to getting a golden violin, but all for the right reasons. That road has a lot of cobblestones of intention, doesn't it? That road to Hell...

Nathaniel Essex is listening, but he could be a thousand miles away, drifting on those melodious tones of the Not-Gloria-Gaynor. He is an odd fish, but he might be listening to a conversation happening half way across the world, also... it's had to tell.

His presentation is impeccabe albeit, all bespoke lines and well pressed waistcoat, moleskin and narry a hair out of place.

But the tapping of one digit on the table in the nook he sits within, might hint of a certain auditory engagement in the moment.

Spawn has posed:
The Hellspawn always makes an entrance, but nobody ever knows about it except those who can somehow sense an entity which is both here and not here at the same time, out of phase with physical reality to the extent that light and radiation pass through it like it wasn't there. This time the seven foot monster passes through a wall far from the entrance and walks toward the dancefloor.

Unseen, the thing treads up to the spot where Lucifer had opened a portal to Hell the last time Spawn visited. It stands there, staring at the hardwood in contemplation. It does not seem aware that others are in the place, or that Lucifer himself is covering a classic track at the piano.

Lucifer has posed:
The DJ has special tracks on board so they can begin at points and give Lucifer a reprieve at the piano. The track plays, Lucifer pulls the microphone from the stand at the piano and continues. "Go on now go. Walk out the door. Just turn around now... cause you're not welcomed anymore. Weren't you the one who tried to hurt me with goodbye, did you think I'd crumble... did you think I'd lay down and cry!? Oh no not I! I will survive.... oh as long as I know how to love I know I'll stay alive. And I've got all my life to live and I've got all my love to give and I'll survive... I will survive..."

The track continues to play but Lucifer has walked his way closer to where Spawn is standing at the 'doorway' that Lucifer had used the other night. The one that led them to Hell. "You can't come knocking whilst the Devil is rocking!" He whisper-sings to the 7 foot not-there-really creature and then moves away.

"Only the Devil gives me strength not to fall apart....tho I try hard to mend the pieces of my broken heart.." One step, two, and he's right in the nook of where Nathaniel sits, grabbing the man by the arm and pulling him out into the public eye. "And I spent oh so many nights feeling sorry for myself. I used to cry. But now I hold my head up high!" And then he holds the microphone TO Nathaniel Essex.

Sinister has posed:
Oh he didn't. Mother of mulchmuck, he entirely did. "You will survive..." the deep voice speaks into the mic, because not hell, nor highwater is going to make Mister Sinister -sing- in public. At least not with this set of vocal chords -- this is not whimsical humming, after all, even with so few in the place.

He looks aside then as he's dragged from the shadow of the nook, looming in the visible plane, but dwarfed by that which isn't quite -there-. He seems to look right AT the Hellspawn, but judging from the steeple of a slight frown, isn't truly seeing the being. Oh, the joys of being a card carrying member of the Society of Psychical Phenomenon, but not being up to his eyeballs in the mystical non-stop.

An aside: "I'm not singing, unless you want to lose loyal clientelle... bagpipes, remember?"

Spawn has posed:
Interrupted from his reverie by Lucifer's pointed approach and low-toned reproach, the Hellspawn raises his glowing green eyes from the floor to watch the club's owner pace away. It glares until the microphone is offered to the pale man. At that point...

Lucifer himself is excluded, and of course anyone who does resist or shield against telepathic "assaults." This one is an extremely mild sensory hallucination, offered to the room at large if anyone is paying attention to it. Those who do will swear, later, that the average-height, athletically built black guy in the stylish black-shirt-on-black-jacket-over-black-slacks suit just opened the main door and walked inside. Even if they weren't looking that direction, if it came up in court, they would swear on a stack of Bibles that, yes, that guy came in the door and walked across the dancefloor toward the bar.

What really happens, though, is that Spawn shapeshifts into the image of the man right there in the middle of the dancefloor and starts walking at the exact moment that the hallucination ends, so that his new and suddenly visible physical shape melds with the hallucination and now he's just another hanger-out at Lux.

Lucifer has posed:
"Hey hey!" Lucifer sings into the microphone and then the song fades and the DJ flips it to some other track. The Devil gives a Grin(tm) to his Knight in Blackened Armor and leans over to give a chaste kiss to Nathaniel's cheek. "You joined in. That's all I can ask of you." He says this much and then his attention turns towards the dance floor where Al has appeared out of seemingly nowhere. Yet from somewhere at the same time.

"Ah, he's taken on an actual form this time. Come, my dearest, and let me introduce you to..." Wait, will that work? Lucifer has to quick-think on if one knows the other exists or not. It would be rude to reveal such a thing to the human visage if that doesn't know what it truly is.... but then it has to know, right? In order to actively take on that form?

"Just. Come. We'll figure out semantics on the way." At least Lucifer's in a good mood.

Sinister has posed:
Looking beyond the devil at the instance of trans-llucination of the entire club, it is WHOLELY clear that the other man in black was entirely immune to the visual chicanery. There's a quiet, but poignant "...Interesting..." as the song is concluded and the kiss is placed.

A blink, then another draws him from what he witnessed to the tall-dark-and-handsome fallen one. "Participation I can indulge, competence I cannot promise..." there's a single touch that traces over hidden things on the Devil's back, beneath the clothing... then he is looking back at the figure on its approach.

Feet engage, clipped steps precise and rhythmical. "Situational Ad-libbing? Oh, wait... this is..." the Spawn, the one that's caused some interest of late and an intriguing short-short version of recent events "...Well, then...." -- a flick of the hand as they approach and there ought to be some kind of ripple in the air to show proof of Power, but there is not. THAT manifests solely in the fact that nobody but the demonically or angelically inclined, other than himself, pays the slightest attention to the trio. Everywhere else, personal conversations or staring at barely clad dancers becomes the most fascinating thing ever, for the diminished crowd.

Spawn has posed:
The Hellspawn, now in the guise of a man who died a long, long time ago, slows down when he realizes Lucifer and Sinister are approaching him and then comes to an abrupt halt when Sinister makes that hand gesture. After just a moment of pause, the space of only two or three heartbeats for those who actually have them, he turns enough to head toward the couple directly and helps them close the distance.

"Call me Al," is offered with a direct look at Lucifer. That deep, measured basso is a far cry from the dry, rasping death-rattle the thing speaks in naturally, and the non-introduction proves that he *does* have the full awareness that he is in fact a Hellspawn in sheep's clothing and that he assumes Lucifer is not fooled by the changed shape.

When the brown eyes turn on Sinister, Al gives a mild smirk. "That would be a cute trick if it was necessary," he observes as he reaches up to brush his hands over his tight fade, as if checking for hairs out of place. It's worth mentioning that, while the *entrance* of the man was a telepathically induced hallucination, the *form* of the man is physical reality.

Lucifer has posed:
Lucifer continues walking forward but he notices that Al is also closing the distance to the two of them. Then the man is asking to call him Al and so Lucifer nods. What the man in front of him doesn't know won't hurt him. "Ah yes. Allow me to make introductions. Nathaniel, this is Al. Came in the other night for the first time and I believe he enjoyed his time here. Hence his return. Al, may I introduce Doctor Nathaniel Essex." The Devil Grins(tm) but there's nothing behind it except genuine intent.

Maybe.

"Oh he does it all the time. We don't quite like to mix business with... Business..." Is explained by Lucifer who has gone as far as retrieving a silver case - engraved with a serpent on one side and crow on the other - from his inner left pocket. Two cigarettes are produced, the case replaced and Lucifer lights those cigarettes with a snap of his finger before proffering one to Nathaniel. "Do you smoke, Al?"

Sinister has posed:
"Necessity is perhaps more subjective than objective," but Lucifer is adding his own take on rationale over obfuscation that prompts an incline of the head. The cigarette is taken, set to lips for a fingerless smoke-dangling drag as he hooks thumbs in his belt, observing with a careful eye, the entire of spawn's presentation. "If you'll be my bodyguard, I will be your long lost pal..." a nod follows "...Paranoia doesn't necessarily mean anything, but the times that it does, I'm grateful for overcautious forethought."

Looking down, then back up the hellspawn he tilts his head. "Intriguing though, you've had Lucifer in quite an interesting conundrum since you showed up. It's interesting to put a face to a name and an awareness."