#stopsignsandcigarettes

[hopeless-healer]

continued for @stopsignsandcigarettes Legal action was something Rio wanted to avoid at all costs, so when Shizuo spoke up with a compromise she was relieved. It was generous of him, considering she owed almost 100,000 yen. Though she wasn't sure why he would help her; she had always heard how scary he was. "Yes. Thank you so much," she nearly choked. "I can do that." She didn't get a paycheck until the weekend, but she would figure something out. She would go through her room and find anything of value she could pawn. She would have that money for him when the next day came. After they left she went to work (apologizing repeatedly for being late) and when she came home she did just that. She grabbed her MP3 player and some jewelry (among some other things) and off she went. She managed to get the 10,000 yen, but just barely. Rio was still nearly ecstatic. That 10,000 would buy her an entire month to figure something out. The pawn shop she had visited was in a pretty shady area, but she was surprised when a woman stopped her as she exited. "You seem to be short on money, dear." The woman was pretty, but she looked tired. Maybe strung out. She didn't let Rio respond. Instead she spoke again. "A pretty young girl like you could make a lot of money fast. Here, take this. Think on it." And she handed her her card. Rio knew exactly what was being implied. She even gave the woman a dirty look as she walked off. But she didn't throw the card away. The next day when Rio heard another knock, the woman's offer was the last thing on her mind. She had a meeting with Shizuo Heiwajima. That was her biggest concern. "I'm happy to tell you I have the money," she said after opening the door.

[hopeless-healer]

Starter for @stopsignsandcigarettes Looking back now, Rio realized her life hadn't been so bad before. She regretted not enjoying how easy things were then. Supporting herself and her mother at eighteen was NOT easy. With her father gone and her mother refusing to get out of bed (she guessed that was where she got her mental health from), it was up to Rio to keep a roof over their heads. She worked as many hours as she could but it still hadn't been enough. Her friends begged her not to get a loan from any of the places around them, but she had insisted she could pay it off. She was wrong. Weeks had passed since her bill was due. She had tried to keep up with it but the interest was insane. She avoided phone calls and tried to keep her head low around town, but she knew her luck would run out sooner or later. It happened one day while she was getting ready for work. A knock on her door. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end and she wanted nothing more than to bolt, but she couldn't just leave her mother there to deal with it. So, in her ridiculous fast food uniform, she worked up the courage to open that door. When she saw just who exactly was on the other side she nearly passed out.

[isaaccecilbryant]

@stopsignsandcigarettes || Continued

“I don’t care.”

The blonde man balled his fists as he watched blood drip from his shoulder onto his pants, anger boiling to a dangerous peak with every drop. His blood, his body, he didn’t give a shit. But these clothes were special. They were the only good thing that had happened to him in a good long while, and now they were ruined with his filthy blood. All because of a potted plant falling from an open window.

Correction: Because of a potted plant that had been dropped from an open window by that piece of shit Izaya.

“I’m gonna kill him,” Shizuo whispered, repeating it like a mantra louder and louder until he was practically screaming.

“I”M GONNA KILL HIM!!!”

Don’t care? Isaac blinked and pulled his hands away. This man had a head injury and was covered in blood, he should care! What was he so fixated on that he didn’t worry about himself?

Isaac got a partial answer right away: murder.

“Oh no! Stop!” Isaac grabbed him by the shoulder to try and hold him down. “You have a head injury! We need to get you to a hospital!” How the hell was this man still standing? He took a full flower pot to the head! Shouldn’t he be unconscious!

“Whoever you have a bone to pick with will still be around once you’re better!” Though hopefully he would forget about starting a fight once he’d been in the hospital long enough to recover.

[cautionstop]

@stopsignsandcigarettes

“Well, well, if it isn’t Shizu-chan. Tearing up Ikebukuro like a bull in a china shop as usual?”

[erikararara]

@stopsignsandcigarettes:

He was pouting. Not openly, and hopefully not to where the brunette before him could tell, but he was truly pouting.

“Wouldn’t have it any other way, huh?” He asked, only half-joking. 

“That's right! If Shizu-chan wasn't tsundere then he wouldn't be himself at all. And what's the point in knowing a person if you don't know who they really are!”

Anger and all, Erika was glad to know him.

[broadswordandpistol]

(( This just in, Shizuo Heiwajima is a really good friend for Alvin. Who knew?

Tacking this up to save. Skype RP/discussion between @stopsignsandcigarettes and Alvin, partially IC, partially OOC, dealing with the other interloper in my brain right now. Thanks, Shizuo, you were a big help. ))

[12/12/16, 8:29:56 PM] Jishin: they really go at it hammer and tongs [12/12/16, 8:30:07 PM] Jishin: it's rough for Alvin, he has standards [12/12/16, 8:30:14 PM] Jishin: Roman just -buzzsaw- [12/12/16, 8:31:35 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): "Roman's got standards too, they're just more utilitarian, that's all. Yours are more moral. It's easy to butt heads with something like that." [12/12/16, 8:31:52 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (Shizuo, are you defending Roman?) [12/12/16, 8:38:03 PM] Jishin: "Roman's standards only serve himself. You can live that way, but that doesn't make them right." [12/12/16, 8:41:28 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): "I can get behind that thinking. Still, not everyone's good at the moral stuff, 'specially him. Having feelings, you know." The blonde is quiet a second. "People like him can throw it away and it makes their lives easier. Everyone wants an easy life." [12/12/16, 8:43:12 PM] Jishin: I'm getting a lecture from Shizuo Heiwajima. And it makes sense. "Heh. You make me almost feel bad for him." [12/12/16, 8:43:29 PM] Jishin: (daaang) [12/12/16, 8:44:48 PM] Jishin: ( Congrats, Shizuo. You have gotten Alvin to realize that he really can't throw away his standards, as much as he often tells himself that he has.) [12/12/16, 8:47:05 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): Behind the sunglasses, Shizuo's eyes close. "I don't feel bad for him, and neither should you. He sure doesn't feel bad about it himself, at least, so why waste it on him?" He lights a cigarette. [12/12/16, 8:47:24 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (Shizuo, the force is strong within you.) [12/12/16, 8:50:33 PM] Jishin: "Maybe because it's easier to pity him than hate him." Although what exactly Alvin hated him for was a complicated mess of problems mostly revolving around Roman's habit of pushing his buttons. There were times when the other man was just fine —

He closed his eyes too. "Thanks." [12/12/16, 8:53:15 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): "Dunno what I did, but you're welcome." The blonde leans back and sighs out some smoke. "I personally envy the bastard." [12/12/16, 8:54:15 PM] Jishin: "Doesn't give a rat's ass and just goes and does whatever he wants." Yeah. [12/12/16, 8:57:19 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): "Doesn't have to worry about hurting anyone cause he only cares about himself. Doesn't have to worry about losing control. About what he's done." Another beat of silence as Shizuo straightened himself. "But the world needs people like us to make sure people like him don't go too far. 'S Unfair, but it's the way it works. At least I think." He scratches his head. "I'm not good at that philosophical stuff." [12/12/16, 9:00:06 PM] Jishin: "You're better at it than me." He frowned slightly, turning the blond's words over again. They made sense. "Not that I'm sure I count more like you than like him." [12/12/16, 9:03:50 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): "Don't piss me off, Alvin." The words came unbidden and unsolicited from the old bartender. His eyes were trained on Alvin in an instant. "I wouldn't be around you if you didn't have good in you. Torchwick is just...in between. You aren't." A short snort escaped his nose. "So don't say shit that doesn't make any sense." [12/12/16, 9:06:53 PM] Jishin: "Hey, the last thing I wanna do is piss you off." It's said with a wink and a smile, though there's a note of self-deprecation lurking in his eyes. "Thanks. ... Again." [12/12/16, 9:08:53 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): It took a second before the blonde looked away. "Don't mention it. And don't think about it, either." He'd done something to Alvin, he could tell, but he wouldn't press the issue. [12/12/16, 9:10:28 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (How'd he convince Alvin not to throw away his morals?) [12/12/16, 9:10:56 PM] Jishin: (Alvin always thinks he has. All the stuff he's done for his mom, those are things he would not do if he felt he had another choice.) [12/12/16, 9:11:29 PM] Jishin: ( so he keeps making these decisions and hating himself but what else can he do?) [12/12/16, 9:12:15 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (Aside from not feel bad about it? Not much.) [12/12/16, 9:12:39 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (Correction: force himself not to feel bad about it.) [12/12/16, 9:12:52 PM] Jishin: (it's easier for him to think of himself as a bad guy than a a good guy, because good people don't make these decisions) [12/12/16, 9:13:35 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (But Shizuo just pointed out that if he does, he'd practically be Roman. Is that it?) [12/12/16, 9:13:51 PM] Jishin: ( yep, that's exactly it, and Alvin can look at that and go I'm not Roman ) [12/12/16, 9:14:11 PM] Jishin: ( I don't fight little girls, I don't blow up airships because it's fun.) [12/12/16, 9:14:47 PM] Jishin: ( not that he would not defend himself from little girls if necessary ) [12/12/16, 9:14:57 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (He wasn't even trying to be insightful. He was just trying to give a new perspective. Oopsie in a good way. XD) [12/12/16, 9:15:22 PM] Jishin: (Alvin needed that perspective, he probably wouldn't have found it on his own.) [12/12/16, 9:15:50 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): "That's what friends are for," (is his response to that.) [12/12/16, 9:18:40 PM] Jishin: "That and carrying a spare light." Kidding. [12/12/16, 9:18:57 PM] Jishin: (I'm really pleased at how comfortable these two are together.) [12/12/16, 9:19:34 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): A chuckle as he reaches out a hand. "Thinking of, ya still got one?" [12/12/16, 9:19:37 PM] Jishin: (also thank you Shizuo, I think you settled their ongoing fight for me) [12/12/16, 9:19:47 PM] Jishin: "Yeah." Hands it over. [12/12/16, 9:20:00 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (It's kinda nice that they can just get real in a nice calm way.) [12/12/16, 9:20:22 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (Oh really now? How so?) [12/12/16, 9:20:44 PM] Jishin: (it's kinda hard to explain; I think Alvin felt a little threatened by Roman.) [12/12/16, 9:20:50 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): "Thanks." Lights yet another cigarette and just relaxes in silence. [12/12/16, 9:21:26 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (Do you think Alvin's going to treat him differently now?) [12/12/16, 9:21:53 PM] Jishin: ( I think they might settle into an amicable friendship as long as Roman doesn't do stuff in Alvin's hearing that'll piss him off. ) [12/12/16, 9:22:14 PM] Jishin: ( he's still a button-pusher but Alvin feels no qualms in decking Roman, interestingly enough.) [12/12/16, 9:22:37 PM] Jishin: ( he tends to keep a tight lid on that around most other people, if they say something hurtful he'll just take it.) [12/12/16, 9:23:26 PM] Mithos Yggdrasill (Hack): (So they'll have an even deeper relationship, despite their differences. That'd be good. ^-^)

[smoothcrmenal]

stopsignsandcigarettes:

With ease and Tetris-like precision, Shizuo fit the boxes on top of the others. 78, 79…why did they need 80 boxes of Dust? It seemed a little in excess to him, but what did he know? He was the muscle and that was what mattered.

It was surprising how accommodating Roman had been with Shizuo’s ‘condition’. He understood that he had violent impulses and worked with them. Roman even knew who he would and wouldn’t hurt and worked with it. So he didn’t hurt people who didn’t hurt him first, his brother got to be the good one in the limelight as a hunter, and the world could keep moving without having to worry too much about a monster on the streets.

The young man turned toward his employer, eyebrows arching in question. “There any kids or women on the train?”

“There shouldn’t be. It’s a cargo train. Another load of Dust from the Schnees. You’d think they’d learn by now.” Roman tapped his fingers in a quick tattoo against the timetable and pushed his chair back. “We’ll grab a copter, track it down, and lift it right out of the cars. Load it back to the copter and fly off without them even knowing what hit them.”

He chuckled softly. “More fun than sitting around here moving crates until they decide they finally want them.”

[broadswordandpistol]

stopsignsandcigarettes:

“Thanks.” Shizuo took the matches gingerly, holding one over the lighter. Flicking the wheel with one thumb and holding the match over the wick with his other hand, the head of the match ignited, giving off the smell of sulphur. He lit his cigarette, flicked the match away, took in a nice, long drag as a dragon or something screeched overhead. “Do you know where the hell we are, by the way?”

“Would you believe me if I said not a damn clue?” Alvin ran a hand through his hair with a wry smile. The stranger looked as out of place as he did, in a totally different way. The cut of his suit was vaguely familiar, but Alvin didn’t dare let himself believe that his new acquaintance might be from Elympios. That sort of wishful thinking never went anywhere.

“This is pretty far from my normal stomping grounds. The city’s called Sybak, from what I understand. Ever heard of it?”