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Summary: Al tracks down Kaji to give him a piece of her mind, and Tony winds up throwing in his two cents.
Date: July 19, 2010
Log Title: In the Dog House
Rating: R (LV)
NYC- Near Master's School of Martial Arts
If you know where to search for what you seek, you will generally find it. And so Alessia is, in her usual button down that's paired with loose khakis this time, and her usual heeled boots. Hair is back in a long french braid, and devoid of makeup, it's easy to see the redhead has not slept well.
With the chaos that Kaji's been through in the past few days, it's easy to see that he as well hasn't slept well, or not at all. It's a wonder that's he's out and about. The mutant is currently just relaxing, or trying to, at a cafe nearby the dojo; sipping on a cup of tea to try and calm his nerves down.
Al's empathy picks up the wuffie's mental signature first, using it like a radar to track him to that cafe, walking up to his table without much of a warning. "Kaji."
Kaji doesn't really flinch, but he tenses up as she comes near; forcing himself to relax before he lets out a sigh. Setting his cup down before he looks up at her. He definitely looks worse for wear. "Alessia, first I want to apologize. Even if you don't want to hear it."
Her expression is certainly not one the wuffie has seen before. It's as closes to being carved from stone that human flesh can manage. Al tosses a twenty down onto the table. "We need to talk, but not /here/. C'mon." Hands slide into her pockets, a button pushed. Letting her phone send Tony a text she'd had ready, that she's found Kaji.
Kaji lets out a heavy sigh as he picks his stuff up, only his backpack at the moment as he gets up and follows Alessia. "I guess here's where I bite the dust," mutters the mutant under his breath. If her empathy is still working over him. Dread. Depression. Sorrow. The three main emotions flowing from him.
Too bad Al just isn't in a forgiving mood. She walks with him, silent, until they're in an alleyway between two buildings. "Ah agreed to help you. Ah didn't agree for ya to go nuts an' clock Tony in the /head/." Her words are heated, and edged sharp as razors.
Kaji is lost at that, as his jaw hangs open for several seconds. "W-what?" He puts a hand on his forehead and shakes his head. "I'd never hurt you guys!" He leans up against a wall and slides down to the ground; letting out a groan as he holds his head in his hands. "Goddamnit."
Alessia doesn't hold back, tearing into his mind with her telepathy. Letting him /see/ what she saw, Tony, on the floor, blood on the carpet, unconscious. "You hit him in the HEAD."
Kaji just stares at the ground as she tears into his head, his eyes squinting shut as he shakes his head violently. "I /Didn't/ do that!" He looks over at Alessia, the mutant already looking stressed out enough. "I would /never/ hurt you, guys! Now you tell me what /you/ saw inside of my head."
"YOU DID. YOU, your body, DID That. Do you know what that did to me? Seein' him lookin' like that? Terrified he wouldn't wake up? Don't you make demands on me. Not after what happened." Al closes in, a poke in his chest followed by a short, hard punch to his throat.
Kaji grunts loudly at the punch, glaring up at Alessia as he coughs to get breath back into his lungs as he wheezes out, "It… may have… been my… body. But… it wasn't… me controlling… it." He coughs hard once more before he lets out a low grumble.
"Tell that one to a jury, Kaji. Ya aren't insane. ya just don't accept what are ya are." And if he's not careful, he's going to get a swift kick to the family jewels with the heel of that boot. Alessia ever mention to either of the boys that she used to dance ballet and do gymnastics? Leg strength, she has it.
Kaji coughs hard once more, letting out a groan as he lets out a grumble. "I'm a… shifter, Al." He coughs another, taking in a deep breath as he continues. "Animal instincts and the like are what I have to deal with. Right now, they're getting to the point where they're affecting me moreso." He clears his throat as he moves to stand up, "Now, please. Tell me. What did you see inside my head."
She snarls at him, face flushing red. "Fuck you. You …Ah can't even tell you what you did to me." One fisted hand shoving into her pocket, that alarm button pushed to call for Tony. She's not sure she won't pull her gun on the wolf right now. "Ya hurt me. Your mind hurt me. How is that /not you/?"
Kaji slams a hand against the wall, hurting him more so than the wall itself. "Do you honestly think that I would hurt my friends?!" He lets out a yell before he leans fully against the wall. "It isn't me because I'd never /harm either of you/. The last thing that I remember is Tony shoving me against the door. I had thought I just walked out of the room." His voice during that losing what anger it had, now flowing into near dread once more.
When the text had come in, Tony was all ready pacing a hole into the ground of a park that was nearby to Taskmasters dojo. How he got talked into letting Al try and speak to Kaji, he doesn't know. Over the course of a few minutes he goes from being anxious, to furious and back again until there is a telltale beep coming from the device in his pocket. Anyone between the park and the dojo that was paying attention would see a casually dressed guy running with a purpose.
Alessia snarls again, moving to shove him up against the wall, another fist to his solar plexus. "You don't remember? You don't even remember me, on the floor, knocked out by what's in your head? You hit Tony with one of his own AWARDS. You left him bleeding, on the floor."
Kaji's eyes go wide as Alessia shoves him against the wall, and then lets out another loud grunt at the punch to his torso. "I remember you on the ground, I tried to see if you were okay! Then Tony came in and threw me off of you! He told me to get out, and then when I was leaving he threw me up against the wall! I don't remember anything after that! Honest! I don't! … I don't…"
"You were the only one there with us. No one else came or went, Kaji. You had to have done it. Now tell me why Ah shouldn't just…" A sound of disgust from the redhead, as she aims to knee him in the junk again.
Tony comes out from between two large trees. He's across the street now from the alley, in a moment he's dodging the traffic to get to the other side as he sees Al take a shot at Kaji. He's all ready in quite a state so by the time he's within a few feet of the pair Al would pick up on the tempest of Tony's feelings. Thankfully, Starks psychic blocks are in place as he finds himself in the alley, his arms coming around Al's waist to try and pull her back from pummeling his least favorite person right now.
Kaji brings his hands down to block that knee from hitting him in the groin as he looks at Alessia. "Al. Trust me. I wouldn't harm you or Tony. I have a feeling that I can tell you who did if you tell me what you saw inside of me… head." That last word is paused before he says it as Tony arrives on the scene. Great… I'm boned.
"But you /did/. You scared the shit out of Tony, and scared the life outta me. How can Ah trust you, after how Ah found him. Ya haven't even really made me feel like you're SORRY." Al fights Tony pulling her back. "Lemme go!"
Tony can't let Al go, even though he feels much the same way she does. His hold is firm, as he tries to calm her down. "Baby, don't do this. Just…let's get out of here."
Kaji turns his head away from the two of them, letting out a sigh. "The fact that I haven't done anything to you should tell you that…" He swallows a bit before he looks back at Alessia and Tony. "I don't know what happened after Tony shoved me against the wall. All I remember after that is waking up back at my apartment…" If Alessia tore through his memories, she'd see that.
"Ah ain't shot him yet, let go." Al is flushed, hair coming loose from that braid. She's not fighting Tony as hard, not wanting to hurt /him/ in her anger. She's the furthest from gentle as she can be, empathetically and telepathically, /shoving/ the image of the city being taken over by forest into Kaji's head.
Tony isn't going to let go of Al, he's trying very hard to remain calm and keep his opinions of this whole situation to himself. As long as nothing escalates he's going to silently lend her his support, however, if things change then all bets are off and Al can shoot Kaji all she wants.
Kaji grunts as Alessia shoves that image into his head, and he presses himself against the wall behind him because of it. He opens his eyes; blinking a few times before he looks at her. "That… that was my mind." He puts a hand to his forehead and lets out a groan, "It's a total wreck." And he looks like that too.
"No, it was a fuckin' picture Ah made up." Al snaps, shoving more imagery. How she tried to push it back, how she tried to make a way for the city to be as it should be. The wolf. The wolf leaping at her, snapping at her, even as she punched it in the nose.
Kaji's eyes get wider at the pictures of the wolf getting shoved into his head, and he's silent for a moment afterwards. "Goddamit. I thought I had him locked away." He puts his hand over his eyes once more, letting out a soft sigh. "He's the one who hit Tony. That wolf isn't /me/. That's the animal side of my mutation." He shakes his head. Course, you're not going to believe that…
"You MORON. HE IS YOU. You can't lock him away, it'll get worse! He attacked me, but he's YOU. He attacked Tony, but he's still YOU. You have to own up, Kaji!" Her hands are prying at Tony's arm around her. Come on, Tony, hasn't she earned the right to give him a beatdown?
Of course he could let his fiery girlfriend loose and enjoy watching Kaji get torn apart but Al would not forgive herself later when she realized she tore a friend a new ass. When did he become the one trying to be the voice of reason? Last night he'd have torn Kaji apart with his bare hands and now here he is trying to keep her from doing it. The tight control he has on his own anger is very loose, so he tightens his hold of her. "Figure it out," his tells Kaji in a low voice that sounds full of gravel.
Kaji winces under her words, and slips down against the ground once more. "Then go ahead." He lets out a sigh. "Take it out on me." He looks up at the two of them and quirks a small smile, "Least now I know that my mind is as fucked up as I'm going to feel." He shifts his eyes over to Tony, "I'm sorry, Tony. For my lack of control and for what I did." Then he looks up at Alessia and continues with, "And I'm sorry, Al. For harming you, and putting you through hell." This is probably the farthest down either of them have seen the shifter.
"You have no /idea/ what you put me through." Al grates out between gritted teeth, tears starting to form, even as she's still angry enough to want to shoot him somewhere non-vital that'll heal. At least she's not wanting to kill him flat out yet, right?
"You're sorry?" Tony growls. Yes, he's not going to stand here any longer and pretend to be calm. "I don't know what you've got going on in your head but you crossed a line." Regardless of whether it was the man before them or some screw loose in his head, it didn't matter, he was dangerous in this state. "My trust in you is shattered. I don't know if I'll ever be able to trust you again." His worse drip like acid upon the pavement.
Kaji looks up at the both of them. "Then what do you want me to say?! What do you want me to do?! Beg for your help like the dirty mongrel that I'm feeling like right now?!" He holds his head in his hands once more, letting out a whine before he drops his arms down into his lap.
"Ah /can't/ help you. Not until you accept what is in your head. What is /you/, Kaji. Ah go in there again, he'll just do what he did. You really want that?"
"The hell you're going to go back into his head," Tony growls. He's had about enough of this, and for some reason lets go of Al as he now towers over Kaji. "Do whatever you have to do to figure yourself out but don't play the pity me act, because I'm not going to give a damn." Breaths are flaring out of Tony's nose as he takes a step backward, reaching for Al's hand. "I'm only gonna say it once, stay away from us. Until you can control yourself, and even then you may have to accept that I might not ever want you near her again."
Kaji looks up at Tony, the mutant looking even more defeated now as he lets out a soft sigh. He doesn't drop eye contact though except at the end. "After losing what friends I've got, how can I gain control back without help from them," comes out in a soft mutter.
"Tony." Al says when he growls, looking surprised at being let go. She joins Tony in standing over kaji, though she doesn't so much tower over him even now. "Ah /can't/. He'll go after me again. You have to accept him, Kaji. That's what he told me. He's /part/ of you. Just…fucking do it."
"What do you expect from me?" Tony sounds amazed. This is just not going to go well from here. In fact, its pretty much a guarantee. "That part of you attacked the woman I love. If that's not enough, it clearly could have killed me. I think I'm entitled to tell you to fuck off for the near future, if ever." Tony tightens the hold he has on Al's hand and starts to turn them out of the alley to go.
Kaji lets out a sigh, muttering to himself now before he looks back up at Tony. He can't even answer that, in fact he just drops his head back down. "How'll you know when I'm back fully in control…"
"Ah'll know. Ah'll be able to tell. But ya sure as hell ain't yet." Al says matter of factly, even as Tony is dragging her away.
Tony stops walking abruptly about a foot out of the alley. "Use the resources available to you." Meaning that Kaji can pour through the libraries and files in the Avenger mansion, speak to other Avengers, Taskmaster even, and/or find a spirit guide or something somewhere. Its about all he can offer right now as things are still far to raw for Stark, especially with other things going on that are causing this situation to be infinitely worse.
Kaji lets out a soft laugh at that, groaning once more as he hides his head in his arms; mumbling to himself. He's going to have to suck it up more than ever to put himself into front lines of this.
