i get knocked down but i get up again (rp for talks_to_tech)

[in_theworks]

It starts, as it always does, with Prime_Eight.

It's not exactly early and it's not exactly late, but Horatio and Josh have already turned in for the night, leaving Wrench and Sitara alone, on the wind down of celebrating their most recent successful op. They've been barhopping all night, Wrench is on his somethingth beer, all is going well, and then a bunch of Lenni's goons walk in.

They recognize them, him immediately, sitting a table not far off the bar while Sitara gets them another round, and make their way over. Wrench sees them coming, and about the time their leader, some skinhead-looking douchebag in a P8 vest, helps himself to a seat at their table, he's on his feet. Prime_Eight, unfortunately, seems to take that as a slight, however, and one of the others steps forward, trying to shove him back into the chair. He holds his ground, tries to push past the guy with a shoulder of his own, and gets treated to another elbow, this one more violent than the first.

The second time, Wrench manages to get past them -- and then freezes when one of them mutters something he doesn't quite catch beyond mask and fag. Normally, he's secure enough it his own masculinity, his own sense of self, that the words wouldn't bother him, but he's a little drunk and a whole lot high from their triumph, still, and so he's willing to go if they are. He's always wanted to kick the shit out of a bunch of Prime_Eight wannabes. It'll be another nice notch in his belt, this evening.

Distantly, he's aware of Sitara calling his name as she catches wind of the situation and starts back from the bar, a warning not to start shit, or not to stoop to their level or whatever, but he tunes her out. He flashes her a (~_^), then fires the proverbial first real shot, not a shove, this time, but a punch. Lieutenant Asshole goes down like the shitsack he is, and a merry (^_^) arcs across the mask as his friends rush in to fill the void.

It's all kind of a blur after that. He gets hit half a dozen times, in the stomach, the chest, the hip as someone aims for his balls, presumably, and he twists away; he returns the favor, flailing dangerously. Someone wraps their arms around his waist from behind, hoping to pin him down; he pushes back against their chest, using it as leverage to kick out, to keep the flurry of blows at bay. Even when it becomes clear he's not going to win this one, too many hands on him, on his arms, holding him down, now, he doesn't stop fighting back, doesn't surrender, like Horatio said of him once, not willing to go quietly. He bucks as they push him down into the bar, but to no avail, and something hot and bright sparks across the face of the mask, stunning him. He gasps for air and the heat on his face, on his face under the mask, lingers.

"Cops'll be here in five minutes, people!" someone yells, though while Wrench misses that much, he doesn't miss the fact that the hold Prime_Eight has on him sudden evaporates. He starts towards the floor, knees losing their ability to support him in slow motion, and then there's a hand on his arm, dragging him back upwards. He pulls away weakly, tries to, and the fingers on his arm twitch before Sitara's voice cuts through the ringing in his ears. "Wrench! Wrench, it's me, relax!"

He does and she drags him towards the door. The two of them trail Lenni's crew out onto the street, away from the promise of the impending police, and then veer in the opposite direction. Sitara pulls them into another bar as a a cop car streaks by them, and once they're inside, pushes him backwards towards the men's room. He stumbles backwards into the door, catching himself on it as it swings open, and skitters inside, all at once more afraid of Sitara than any of Prime_Eight's goons, if only for the look on her face. She backs him into the sole sink in the room, and he holds up his hands at once, trying to hold the inevitable dressing down he's about to get at bay.

"Sitara, wait," he starts, stops as something on her face changes, deflates. Confusion registers on the face of the mask, alternating (O_o) and (?_?) -- or it should, anyway. Instead, there's another sharp, white flash behind his right eye, and swears immediately, reaching up for his face.

"Oh, my God," she breathes, reaching for him, too, "your mask." Her fingers hesitate on his skin just below where the mask starts, then snap back all at once. For a moment, Wrench thinks she finally remembered herself, but then she's reaching for him again. "Shit, you're bleeding."

He weaves when he should be bobbing, but he still manages to duck away from her fingers and turns to face the mirror. The mask, caved in and cracked over one eye, greets him in the mirror and when he tries for a look of shock, its face only displays one of the exclamation points and fries him again for good measure. He starts a step back from the mirror, almost tripping on Sitara in the process, and hisses an "Ah, fuck," as the mask goes dark. It can't even manage the default (x_x), apparently, and for better or for worse, yes, he is bleeding and distantly aware of the smell of singed hair.

"Fuck," he repeats, as he turns under Sitara, facing her.

"No joke," she shoots back, reaching for him again.

He tries to fight her off, really he does, but this time, he doesn't have much in the way of luck, and before he knows it, she's leaning around him to rest the mask on the edge of the sink. He looks away when she returns her attentions to him, caught somewhere between trying to sink as far into the hood of his sweatshirt as he can and all but looking over his shoulder, the side of his face with the birthmark turned away from her. She studies him for a moment, even so, and he makes a small noise, near-choking on his shame. He ignores him and reaches up to touch her fingers to what's very clearly a cut on his face, and he sucks in a sharp breath, regaining the one stolen from him when she took off the mask.

"I don't think it's that bad," she tells him after a minute, pulling away. He turns his head just the tiniest bit, trying to follow her out of the corners of her eyes as she moves for the paper towel dispenser on the wall. She glances back over her shoulder at him again, as she begins to crank out a length of wadding, and he drops his gaze again. "It's gonna bleed like a bitch, and I'm pretty sure you're mask is fucked, but ... "

"I'll figure it out," he tells her immediately, almost violently.

Humming, she wads up the paper towel and turns back, passing it to him. Her jaw works, as he takes it from her, like she plans on arguing (or, at very least and most likely, suggesting he not put the mask back on until he does, for fear of setting his face on fire), but whatever it is dies on her lips as the door starts to open. Immediately, she's on in front of it, one foot catching the door to stop it before she kicks it back shut. There's a bit of a struggle as she reaches for the lock, and to ensure her victory, she yells, "I'm giving him a blowjob!"

The door stops ratting all at once, and after a beat, Wrench tries, "Don't I wish."

"Mm, no," Sitara says, managing to make her refusal sound casual enough that it doesn't make Wrench feel like she's judging him and his face. Leaning back into the door, she crosses her arms over her chest. "Take a minute and get cleaned up, then we'll go home."

"Yeah," he answers, turning back towards the mirror. He catches her eyes briefly in the reflection before he looks away again, tending to gash on his forehead, left by the mask as it caved in. He puts the offending thing back on, once he's done and once he's turned it off so he doesn't end up shocking himself again, and in silence they walk back towards the hackerspace. Wrench isn't sure if that's a good thing or a bad one, but he's too tired, now, and too sobered by the events on the last hour to press it.

He falls onto the couch when he reaches it, wakes up at some ungodly hour, half-hungover and feeling the beating he took, and pulls himself upright with a groan. He gets up, heading for one of the cabinets under his work space, and comes up with a bottle of aspirin. Shaking two into his hand, he puts on a pot of coffee to take them with -- and, more importantly, to work with. He might as well, he figures. Now is the only time he's going to get in the hackerspace alone, and he needs to get the mask fixed before anyone wanders down for the day.

Four hours later, and he's gotten exactly fuck-all anywhere, for all that he's finding he needs a second pair of hands to fix what those Prime_Eight assholes did to the mask and, after leveling a kick at the leg of his table, he throws his head back and howls "Fuck!"

He has no idea that, at some point in the last few hours, he's gathered an audience.

Comments

[talks_to_tech]

Unlike the rest of the group, Josh doesn't really drink. A lot of it has to do with the assorted potential side effects of his medication, and some more has to do with the fact that he has enough issues with social interaction without the additional hurdle of intoxication. All that means that, this morning, he's fully expecting to be the first one down into the hackerspace, just there to check in on things and make sure nothing's exploded overnight while the rest of them sleep off their hangovers. He's not surprised to see the soles of Wrench's shoes facing him from the couch, and he heads quietly to his own workstation without turning up the lights or music, intending on letting Wrench sleep.

He's absorbed in his code when Wrench stirs, and Josh mostly ignores the sounds the other man makes as he fumbles around. He recognizes the sound of pills, the sound and blooming scent of the coffee pot, but he doesn't raise his head as he sorts through and adjusts some values, attention fully on what he's doing.

Wrench's kick startles him out of it, though, and he jumps, half-turning in his chair to see what's going on. His eyes settle first on the mask, on the fact that there's obviously something wrong with it from the exposed wires he can see. Some other part of his brain pings to the fact that the mask is on the table which means Wrench isn't wearing it which means that --

His eyes flick to the Wrench's face briefly. Josh might not be good at picking up social cues, but the mask is a giant (literally) flashing sign that says Wrench doesn't show his face, which means that Josh shouldn't be looking. He pulls his eyes away in the next instant, that in mind. For a moment longer, he hesitates, sure he should turn back to his computer - but Wrench is a friend, a friend that's obviously having trouble in this moment, and he can't turn his back on that.

Quietly as always, he pushes his chair back and stands, moving closer to and then around Wrench, standing at the corner of the table where he can reach, still keeping his eyes on the mask. "Show me how to help," he requests simply.

[in_theworks]

"Oh, holy shit," Wrench hisses as he backpedals away from Josh, again not having realized he was there. A pause follows as he gets over the initial shock, reorients himself, and then hurriedly, he reaches for the edges of the hood of his sweatshirt, pulling it back up over his head where it had slipped when he threw his head back. He slouches into it, as if it will help any more than it did to hide his face from Sitara, and despite the fact that Josh doesn't seem to be making eye contact, lowers his own gaze. He looks decidedly smaller, somehow, as he rocks back towards the table. The breath he blows out, finally, deflating him, doesn't really help.

"You scared the shit outta me, man," he mumbles, an explanation. A pause follows, and then he reaches for the mask, starting, "But, uh. I need help getting the LED plate off. Preferably without destroying any more of the wiring than those Prime_Eight fuckers already wrecked."

[talks_to_tech]

Josh takes a step back, too, partly out of reflex but mostly to give Wrench a little more space. He's careful not to watch Wrench pull the hood back up, though he does register it out of the corner of his eye.

"I'm sorry," he says into that pause - and then nods. "I can do that. The fasteners might have gotten bent in the impacts. You might need something to pry them back out."

He figures Wrench would rather be the one doing the actual prying, but he can hold it for him.

[in_theworks]

Wrench waves the apology off, knowing that Josh didn't mean it. If he was feeling better, he might make some crack about getting him a bell, because this isn't the first time Josh has been just there, and he suspects it won't be the last, but -- well, he's not feeling better. He's tired and hungover and sore and really, really glad Josh seems to be adverting his eyes, as near as he can tell, because he can't quite bring himself to look at him full on, either.

As it is, he just reaches for a handful of tools, a screwdriver and pair of pliers among them, and slides them into Josh's line of sight. "Yeah, that was my thought. I need someone to hold onto the mask while I do the prying, though."

[talks_to_tech]

"I can do that," he says again, reaching out carefully, almost tentatively, to pick up the mask, considering he feels a little bit like he needs permission. He does follow through with the motion, though, holding it toward Wrench so he can get to where the faceplates connect to the rest of the mask's structure.

[in_theworks]

"Thanks, dude," he breathes, the sigh the words are borne on at odds with the fact that, yes, he is cringing a little to see Josh touch the mask. It's not that he doesn't trust him to be careful with it, it's just -- well, it's complicated. He's just relieved he didn't hold it up to him, that he doesn't have to look at him.

"Anyway, uh," he continues after a beat, albeit no more effectually. Committing to the screwdriver after a moment's thought, he suggests, "Just kinda -- watch your hands, okay?" He's not sure this is going to work, or that he won't slip in trying to make sure it does, and accidentally gouge the mask or Josh.

[talks_to_tech]

"You're welcome," Josh returns dutifully. He doesn't hold the tone against Wrench considering yes, he does know what the mask means to him - or at least has an idea.

He nods. "I trust you," he says simply. He does adjust his grip, though it's more to try and give Wrench better access than worry for himself

[in_theworks]

"Which I appreciate -- " More than Josh knows and especially right now, as exposed and small and worthless as he feels. " -- but seriously, man." He chances a glance up at Josh then, trying to convey some sense of gravity with a look. When Josh readjusts, Wrench drops his eyes again, on a breath out.

"But okay, here we go," he mutters, finding the edge of the LED plate with the tip of the screwdriver. He feels along it, searching for imperfections, breaks, bends, and when he finds something, slips it under and pulls. It takes some doing, and the plastic creaks in protest, but eventually one side pops up. He trades the screwdriver for his fingers, digging them under it, and sooner rather than later, he's got the plate off in entirety.

Pulling out the ruined screws, bent as Josh suggested, he peers into the wiring, frowning. "I'm gonna go out on a limb, here, and say that it's probably some kinda miracle I didn't end up looking like Ghost Rider at some point, last night." You know. With his head on fire and all. The wiring, as it turns out, is pretty badly fucked, if only in part.

[talks_to_tech]

Josh glances back, eyes flickering briefly over Wrench's face for a moment - but even then, it's in the way he usually does, trying to pick up any subtleties of expression, not an actual study of Wrench's face.

He looks back down when Wrench sets to work, bracing the mask against the table as Wrench pries the plate free. "You already wear enough leather. Flaming whips aren't really practical, though," he returns dryly.

[in_theworks]

"Practical? No," Wrench allows, giving Josh the all clear to let go of the mask with a gesture. He ducks under the table, that said and done, clearly looking for something, and apparently buoyed a little by the fact that Josh can't see him, can't stare even if he hasn't really been, if the fact that there's a little more levity in his tone as he continues, "Kind of awesome, though. Like 'I might have to figure that out, later, once I'm back in one piece' kind of awesome."

A pause follows, a hesitation as he has to lean back out of his unintentional hidey hole, and then he asks, "You seen my soldering iron?" It might have been his to start with, but they've all used it enough times since he came to DedSec that it might be at anyone's workspace.

[talks_to_tech]

Josh sets the mask down again and takes a step back, still watching the mask instead of Wrench himself. He tilts his head a little, thoughtfully. "The fuel source would be your problem. You'd lose a lot of maneuverability in the whip because you'd need a constant flow, and you don't want to risk any backflow so the whip is the only thing on fire."

He blinks at the question, eyes flicking to Wrench again. "Um... Horatio's desk, maybe? I can..." he begins, gesturing vaguely in that direction. He can go get it, if Wrench wants.

[in_theworks]

"Yeah, man," he answers, when Josh offers to go look for the soldering kit. A pause follows, as he tucks himself back under the table, searching for other things, now, and then he continues, "But yeah, I'm thinking you'd need something like ethanol gel for fuel. That'd keep it from running down your hands, the second you tried to do just about anything, and catching you on fire in the process.

"Delivery would be a bitch to figure out, though," he continues after another beat. Like, you could probably rig it to work like one of those toilet cleaning gel wands, where you push a button and it oozes out and ignites on contact with the air, but ... man, the tank you'd need for a solid fuel would be a bitch. You run into the same problem that explains why we won't have real, working ligtsabers yet."

[talks_to_tech]

Josh moves away from Wrench's bench, heading for Horatio's desk. It doesn't take him long to find the kit and make his way back, setting it down next to the mask where Wrench can reach for it.

"Right," he agrees, tilting his head again as he thinks, as he tries to work out the actual logistics of this. "If your fuel burned long enough you could extend the time before you had to dispense more... but that wouldn't work in an actual combat scenario since you would still need to have the fuel on you." He pauses. "Hm."

He's going to have to think about this.

[in_theworks]

"Thanks," he mutters, surfacing from under the table, briefly, to pull the iron out of the case and plug it in, letting it get hot. When he disappears again, he continues, louder, "It'd be easier to do, like, Whiplash's gear. You'd still need a disproportionately big power source, since arc reactors? Sadly not a thing, yet. But you could hide that in a backpack or whatever."

There's another pause, as he surfaces from under the table finally, a handful of tools spread out on the table alongside the mask, now, and then, "And sure, yeah, you could probably carry a camel pack around, with the ethanol gel, but ... yeah, still not so plausible." You'd still have a very short window to actually be able to use the Ghostrider whip.

[talks_to_tech]

"Yet," Josh echoes and agrees, because batteries get smaller and last longer all the time. "Maybe something like a taser where you turn it on in a short burst just before impact. Like the flash on an older camera. You'd have to let it build up again before the next burst, and it wouldn't look as impressive, but it could be effective."

He's still looking down, thinking, when Wrench straightens next. "Sadly no."

[in_theworks]

"Okay, that -- " Wrench starts, shooting a quick, gleeful glance back at Josh. " -- would be amazing." He remembers his place in the next second and snaps his attentions back away from him, shoulders hunching as he tries to disappear into his hoodie. It takes him an embarrassingly long time to find his words again.

"Anyway, uh. I'm gonna need someone to play nurse, here, and hand me shit." And provide a second pair of hands, still, when he needs things held in place. Which is to say Josh doesn't have to run off, even if he can't keep his shit together.

[talks_to_tech]

Josh shoots him a quick grin of his own - yes, yes it would be - but he pulls back, too, as Wrench does.

"Of course," Josh agrees. "Just tell me what you need."

Josh doesn't really notice if anything's awkward considering he has trouble keeping track of that sort of thing, so don't worry about being embarrassed, Wrench.

[in_theworks]

"Right now," Wrench starts, reaching for the soldering iron, now how, "I'm gonna need you to pull the wires, once I've got them disconnected from the LED plate." A pause and then he adds, "And don't worry about trashing 'em. I'm already kinda gonna do that."

He's going to have to completely rewire the face plate from scratch, but that was always the case, given that some of the wires are exposed, cut from where the plate shattered.

[talks_to_tech]

"It's already pretty trashed," Josh returns and agrees. "Do you have pliers?"

He can just do it with his hands, but the pliers will be better considering how small everything is in the mask. He doesn't want to make any of it worse than it already is.

[in_theworks]

"Oh, uh," he starts, something in his tone distracted and apologetic all at once. He leans away grabbing a pair of pliers from the mess of tools he's peppered the table with and passes them to Josh. "Here, dude."

He'll cut the main lead to the power supply first, too, so Josh doesn't have to worry about accidentally frying himself, never mind the fact that the thing is off.

[talks_to_tech]

Josh takes the pliers, turning his head a little to the side and shifting to get a better angle on it as he goes to work on the wires carefully but firmly. He might not be the engineer Wrench is, but he still knows his way around small electronics.

"How long did it take you to make the mask the first time?" he asks without looking up. He knows he already asked Wrench if he made it, back when they first met, but he hadn't pressed much beyond that. He doesn't want this to turn into awkward silence.

[in_theworks]

"The good one?" Wrench asks without looking up, busy disconnecting the wires with the soldering iron. "Or, like, version 1.0? Because that one was a piece of shit. I think I threw it together in, like, half an hour, tops?" There weren't any real electronics involved in that one.

Rather than explain that, however (or give Josh a chance to clarify, really), he continues, "The first one that was on the level with this took -- I don't know, maybe a couple of days?" He shrugs. "Putting it together wasn't really hard; programming it was what took the longest."

[talks_to_tech]

Josh shrugs a little in lieu of actually answering, curious about any incarnation of the mask Wrench wants to expound on. "It was the first thing I noticed." He pauses a beat. "Obviously." Considering it's Wrench's face. "But the work you put into it."

He had been impressed as soon as he had seen it.

[in_theworks]

"I might call bullshit, if you weren't you," Wrench tells him, taking the time to look up now, however briefly. When his eyes drop again, he continues hurriedly with, "No offense, dude, just .... my Engineering Fu isn't what most people usually notice, right off the bat."

[talks_to_tech]

Josh catches his eyes this time, smiling a little in the instant before he catches himself and looks away. "That's their problem," he returns as evenly as ever. "I mean, unless you're pointing a gun at them or something, then that's probably a bigger problem."

He sounds a little puzzled, and he's mostly joking, though it's, as always, a little hard to tell with Josh.