9752/Gotham Is Magic. If Magic Were a Trash Filled City.

Gotham Is Magic. If Magic Were a Trash Filled City.
Date of Scene:	25 October 2019
Location:	West Chelsea Park, West Chelsea Hill
Synopsis:	A Vampire and a Wizard due battle... with quips and willy European words.
Cast of Characters:	Constantine, Selene (Underworld)

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Constantine has posed:
John always kind of liked Gotham from a introspective standpoint. It didn't try to be something it wasn't. Sitting on one of the most powerful laylines in the Northern hemosphere, it was tainted and twisted by that magic by every tragedy that befell it. Most practitioners would argue the contrary with him, of course, but they would be wrong.

At least John would say they were wrong.

With his jacket up over his head to act like a rain coat, the scruffy blonde dabbler ducked beneath the slanted roof of a bathroom building that smelled of shit, piss, and liqour behind him.. A hand jerks at the side of his coat, flicking water off the old drab garment before he drops a hand into a pocket where he keeps his cigarettes only for the pack produced to be empty.. "Perfect." Crumpling the paper carton in his fist and tossing it to the side with that single word spoken bitterly at his own cursed luck.

Selene (Underworld) has posed:
Its almost Halloween, Gotham is getting weirder.

There's riots on the streets as people claim that the Batman is dead and the Bat-family isn't up to the task of taking the city back from the criminals now.

Selene is out on her motorcycle, zipping through the streets and tending to her own goals and needs. These are the hunting of those she'd come half way around the world to track. The Lycans of Hungary, of the Corvinus bloodline.

Her motorcycle stops outside of a park, a park known for criminal activity from murders, to drugs to rape, it has it all... such a lovely park.

The black clad Death Dealer dismounts her bike and spends a moment stalking the perimeter of the park, her eyes upon it as she moves through the darkness of night all around. This is what John would see as he fished for a cigarette, a woman in tight fitting black leather and a long black trench coat, just walking past him like she were stalking something in the park, in its dark.

Constantine has posed:
John hasn't much concern at all for the riotious nature of Gotham or the costumed cadre of children out pretending to be superheroes. The mundane world can keep itself busy while he deals with real problems, he says, and if they don't invite him for tea? More the better... "I hear they're all shit conversationalists anyways.."

The blonde does spy the leather clad Death Dealer on her black motorcycle, because leather bound, and watches her out of the corner of his eye while flicking a finger through the ashtray stand of half burned cigarette butts with just the tip of said finger. "You know it's raining." It's more of a statement than a question, but certainly an open ended statement that, by her general demeanor, may well go more ended and less opened.

"You have a fag on you?"

Selene (Underworld) has posed:
Being that Selene had spent most all of her 600+ years in Europe, she was used to the accent that John speaks when he speaks out to her, as well as the words he uses. She turns to look at him and he'll see it on her face more than likely, he's a smart man and he knows her kind more than likely as well. She's a vampire. Her skin is pale as can be and her breathing isn't creating any steam in the cold air. She... looks young though, 19 or 20 maybe, but he's wise enough to know that looks mean nothing when it comes to the age of the Vampire, its all about how they carry themselves to tell their age even remotely accurately.

"I don't." Selene says back to him, her voice is husky and laced with a mixture of accents he's likely comfortable with as well. Her hair is wet, matted down around the sides of her pale skinned face, her eyes are a solid dark brown hue. "And rain has never bothered me that terribly much." She adds.

Her walking stops as she turns to look at him more fully. "You're a police officer?" She asks, judging by his... everything.

Constantine has posed:
John links the dots instantly upon seeing the pale face and dim eyes looking back at him, "Well that prenicious.." He murmurs to himself, but he lacks the general fearful quality most normal people might adopt in the face of a not so living and not so breathing predator of the night. Instead he decides on one of the butts from the ashtray and pops it between his lips gingerly, completely unphased by the possibility for hepititis C or Herpes, both of which it is entirely possible he has anyways.

He survived the 90s, after all. Lots of drinking.

After watching Selene for a second longer, scratching at his beard with the tips of all fingers on his right hand, then drops his hand away and into a pocket for an metal match box. Held between index finger and thumb, he brings it up and rattles it near his ear to the thankful sound of a single strike match still inside, "Is it the divorced look that gives me away?" He muses, merthless smile as he strikes the match and holds it up to the end of the straightened cigarette with both hands out and around to shield it from the kick of a breeze blowing rain in at him.

That first drag is a big one, "I swear I've seen you before.." Tilting his head side to side, half illuminated by the glow of a long drag, "Anyways, probably just one of those faces, innit? You seen one blood sucker you've seen them all."

Selene (Underworld) has posed:
Selene gives a look down the darkened Gotham street that the rain is pattering down upon the bricks of, then she looks back to the man before her taking a thrown away cigarette butt to light it and further enjoy whats left of it. She doesn't really react to that, she's seen worse.

His joke about law enforcement having bad home lives causes her to look back at him and she parts her wet lips just to nod once toward him, an upward tip of her chin. "Its your arrogance." She replies then, not really in an offensive way, just a matter of fact way. "That and I've seen cops here, making deals with criminals on some nights. That wouldn't be why you're here now, would it?" Selene asks him, her head just gently tilting toward her right shoulder where the water from her hair drips onto her already soaked black leather coat.

"You're certainly perceptive enough to be a police officer." She comments then in her aristocratically flavored voice. "If you're good enough to make that mark on me..."

Constantine has posed:
"In some cultures, Arrogance is another word for charming." There is literally no place where that's true.

There is no place except GREECE where tha-..

There's no place except Greece and ITALY where that's true.

Constantine is neither of those things.

The cigarette glows a few more times with quick drags and then flies off his knuckle with the flick of his middle finger. Turning end over end like a fireball until the rain hits it and extinguishes the amber, even as smoke still coils out from his nostrils.

"Huh.. maybe I am a cop if that's all the criteria. Shattered home life, deals with dark and stormy people in the dead of night, and a liqour problem." At least there's alcohol in the flask, which has a big prominent Unorthodox cross on the side flicks up to his lips, then held out to the vampire. Unbashfully sizing her up.

"I've heard stories of your type... black clad ghouls out engaged in a bitter feud for the good of her people, and blah blah blah, all that melodramatic bollocks.. Why can't the supernatural just get along, anyways? If they're not killing each other, it's the muggles doing it.. supernatural on supernatural hate crimes have been a leading cause of mystical death since the darkages."

Selene (Underworld) has posed:
Everything that Constantine says leads to one reaction out of Selene, she grins. She grins and looks away from him only to shake her head in the rain and tip her chin up high enough so she can level her gaze and then look back to him a moment later.

"You're going to speak to me on the subject of melodrama?" She asks him then, not really annoyed more than she is just unadulteratedly amused by him. She eyes HIM up and down with a stare that ends back upon his own gaze. "You're quite literally the epitome of a Noire film, what with standing out here in the rain and pontificating your place within the hierarchy of an already heavily corrupt local police force."

Selene's eyes cast around and she spares a moment before speaking again. "One moment, I'm looking for the saxophone player you've undoubtedly hired to suddenly start to play in an echo-y alleyway." She even holds up a hand to 'hush' him while she searches visually for it before she stops and lowers said hand and looks back to the man.

She's still grinning. For whatever reasons. "Come off it. You're not a cop. You're just another Gotham tramp, found a trench coat on a homeless person who was squatting in your box last night and now you're playing 'pretend'?"

Truth is, Selene has time to kill and she's just playing with this man now, since he seems to be a bit fun.

Constantine has posed:
"It takes one to know one, love." Constantine sips again from the flask left hanging from his fingers rather than taken and then recaps it into a pocket of his coat, "Oh wait.." Patting a pocket, "Ahhh.. blessed stars." A pack of cigarettes, fresh, unopened, he holds it up to his nose to smell the wrapping with eyes upon Selene with a grin of his own.

The battle of wit hardly bothers him much, no more so than the alluding to him being a film noire, tour de force.. "You've me pegged. From my beard to my oxfords, I'm the classical definition, complete with loose morale compass and..." Tapping the air then going about pulling the plastic from the paper carton. One of the cigarettes is captured between his lips, pack slid away, metal match book up rattling hear his ear.

Ellatedly slipping the single match from the previously empty box to once more strike and light his cigarette. Gazing at Selene through the glow. With it waving in his fingers, he blows smoke off to the side into a chortling laugh, "A tramp.. I've been called that, yes."

The cigarette settles in his lips so his hands can settle in the pockets of his coat, "I'm not pretending, though. I really am a tramp." Clearly not one in any rush to be away from the scary vampire lady, "So, here we are, a pair of walking cliches with our sorted dramatus personas."

Selene (Underworld) has posed:
"So then we've both guessed what the other is." Selene responds to John being a tramp. She shows him a faint smile then before she glances back toward the park and lets her eyes linger on it for a spell. "Well, Sir Tramp...."

She turns her attention back toward him and pulls her phone out of a pocket on her jacket, not afraid of it being rained upon she turns it on and takes a moment to pull something up. A picture, of a small Asian man who is more than a little rotund. "I'm looking for this man." She display it for him to see, its screen streaked with water but the image plenty visible in the otherwise dark of night. "His name is Wutan, he's foul tempered and believes himself to be a godsend to the female gender." Selene glances up to John. "Probably not that dissimilar from you in that regard." She quips before looking back down to the picture on the phone.

"I don't suppose you've seen him tonight, have you?" She then asks. "He has colleagues who work in this neighborhood and I have a few questions for him. If only I could track him down..." She raises her eyes again to look at him, tilting her head again toward her right shoulder as a calm expression graces her pale skinned face's sculpted features and she awaits his answer. "Unless you've been too busy smoking other people's fags to notice..." She has to get a little dig in, for the game of it.

Constantine has posed:
Constantine straightens his neck out with a drag, squinting one eye at Selene with smoke getting into it off the end of his smoldering cigarette. His fingers scissor out, then close around it to flick ashes down upon the ground beneath him. He doesn't seem all that bothered by the rain either, jacket damp on one side pointed out towards the down pour turned drizzle, but with a hand in his pocket as she fishes for her phone and produces the picture from the card slot on one side.

John even makes a show of leaning in, exhaled smoke lingering around his face as he regards the rotund man, then as he regards Selene when she compares the pair by merit of their sexual exploits with fair maidens of the fairer sex. "Oh, from the sound in your voice, I'd wager you're at least partially interested in finding out..." Another drag, cigarette left to rest between his lips so he can take the picture.

"You're lucky I've a soft spot for leather pants on skinny women with big .... egos.." Smirking slightly, he holds a hand down over the image, fingers glowing faintly orange/white as he casts a divining spell upon the image. Speaking in, probably some hybrid of latin, something not spoken much... even as long as Selene's been alive. Maybe notes of Aramaic..

With his spell complete, the picture is held back out to her between two fingers, "His eyes will always look in the direction you need to go to find.." Cigarette scissored between his fingers again, puffing out smoke into the stormy night. The small photograph juts up with a curl of his fist the first time she reaches for it, "This bloke your ex? Owe you a pence?" Straightening his fingers back out for her.

Selene (Underworld) has posed:
"Perhaps after you've showered." Selene teases the cigarette smoking man at his take on her desire to 'find out'. Her eyes then drop down to her phone to watch him do his little thing while she showed the hints of a smirk at his comment on leather pants. "Its a body suit, actually." She corrects him. "The corset throws you off, I understand." She glances up at him to smirk before her eyes lower again to see and hear the spell cast.

Once its said and done she tilts her head again to stare at him. "More pieces fall into place, more of the puzzle shows itself. A wizard, a sorcerer, a magic caster. You're type is rare these days." She states then, taking the device back she glances down at it. "This will be useful. Thank you." And that is said with sincerity and honesty behind her smooth voice, She'll be able to use this go to right to where he is... once he looks at enough things that she can peg his location of course. "And no, not an ex, he's a weapons dealer, dealing arms to the ones that I'm... how did you put it? Feuding with?" It was more accurate than even he likely realizes.

She puts her phone away again then and looks back up to him. "I understand why you were being vague with my questions then. Someone of your ilk is likely working on something... important." A light nod is given to him then. "I could use someone with your ability, you know? What say we trade contact information, perhaps you have use of a cliche such as myself at some point?"

Constantine has posed:
"I showered plenty in my twenties, I'll have you know." By the look of him, that is his twenties again ago, but he has that spritely appearance of youth anyways. Or that appearance of someone trying desperately to hold onto it... His hand flicks at his curled bangs as she retakes the phone and the hand what held it out drops in his pocket.

"Yeah, for good reason too." The cigarette moves to his lips then, another drag of hard grey smoke from his nostrils as he looks about them with shifty, entirely dramatized, paranoia. "The Spanish Inquisition is still out their, love.. Waiting beneath every cobble stone in this god forsaken city. Gothic..." Ashes fall from the end of his cigarette, "So spookie." Wiggling his fingers at Gotham.

Eyes once more on Selene, "Yeah? Let me guess, probably hairy lads that turn into wolves innit?" His turn to fish around in a pocket, several different pockets at that, until he comes out with a business card. 'John Constantine: Paranormal investigator' Hellblazer, "You've probably heard of me.." Pointing at the card with the pair of fingers holding his cigarettes, "I'm kind of a big deal."

He's teasing, mostly. For his grin he probably is.

"I can always use a Bonny in a corset around to throw things off, yeh."

Definitely teasing. This is smirk town.

Selene (Underworld) has posed:
"Yes it smells like its been at least that long." Selene teases him about his last shower but she just smirks lightly before the squeaking wheels of a shopping cart being pushed by a hobo into an alleyway across the street causes her to look in that direction. "So very spooky." Selene replies then after letting her eyes linger on that homless person before she returns them over to John.

"Hairy and lads and werewolves are one way to describe them, yes. Several ways, I suppose, actually. But it is a bit more complicated than simply that alone, but by the sounds of it you have me all wrapped up in a box. So I won't go into greater detail simply to bore you while you stand out here in the rain and smoke yourself into a coughing demise." She can tell he knows his stuff though, the spell he'd cast and the information he's already divined from her, not many are that good, very few actually and in her six hundred years of doing this she's ran into less than one can count on a single hand.

The business card is accepted and glanced over, his boasting about her having heard of him gets a shake of her head while she looks it over. "I haven't, no." She states without even a moment of hesitation after he'd said it. She's being honest, but also just trying to rib him a little more for the fun of their banter so far.

She reaches into her pocket her phone had gone back into then and she draws out a small slip of paper that has a number written on it, just a number and nothing more. She carries a few of them around every night she's out, just in case she makes a contact like this. She offers it to him. "Selene is my name." She tells him. "I'm sure you haven't heard of me. But then you seem to know so much already, perhaps you know me better than I know myself?" She tilts her head again as she stares him after saying that last part.

Constantine has posed:
"Don't be alarmed, I'm use to being underestimated." Constantine takes another drag from his cigarette and flicks it out towards the sound of the squeaking wheel. Not specifically to hit the one producing it as generally just responding to the sounds presence out there in the rainy darkness of the park. With hands free, he returns both to the pockets of his coat with smoke escaping into the air where it mingles the growing fog after an early fall rain in musky Gotham.

"Everything is a little more complicated than we describe it, but I do get a feel for people, it's one of my lesser known, favorable qualities." Grinning through the days worth of dark blonde stubble on his jaw. Eyes alight as he watches Selene watching him. "I've been to hell and back, dove. Literally. You don't survive a thing like that without picking up an eye for details.." Which leads to one of his more known, lesser favorable qualities.

The ability to talk his way INTO someones bad graces.

Probably then out of them, but definitely into them first.

When the slip of paper is presented, he takes it and looks at the number while repeating the name it's attached to. "Selene. You sure this isn't some live action nonsense you're up to? I know Role playing in person went out the window a decade ago with Virtual reality, but you're kind of the poster child of the Vampire the Masquerade pin-ups.." Squinting an eye, head tilted backwards at her, "I kid you because you walked out of the house casually in black leather one piece and a corset... with those boots, that jacket... you've flare and nobody with that kind of flare is easily offended." A pause.

"Unless you've daddy issues, which I can work with too." Hands in pockets, open out his jacket in a sorta shrug.

"My point is, I bet you're a deep set resevour of surprises."

Selene (Underworld) has posed:
The sounds of thumping base come out of the alleyway followed by a crash of metal and some muffled voices shouting. A car with no headlights on emerges with that shopping cart that the homeless man had been pushing in front of it being pushed back out of the alleyway with no homeless man associated with it any more. The car stops and the cart goes rolling off into the street. From inside the car the music is loud, but muffled by closed windows, Selene glances in it's direction again before she looks back to John and smirks softly at him.

"I learned a long time ago that clothing like this can achieve a great many things if you use it properly. It loosens the tongues of the weak willed and exposes a wide variety of personality traits that you can utilize to your advantage, be they rooted in fear... or brash overconfidence." She pauses. "Plus, I enjoy how it feels." She then shows a light smile.

The car with the thumping music pulls out of the alleyway completely and takes a right hand turn which leads it out onto the main street where it starts to roll down it at around 15 or so mph. Selene glances at it again before she parts her lips and looks back to John.

"I believe I have to be going. If you're ever in need of a Role Playing Vampire who lives in her parent's basement, you've my number now, Wizard. Perhaps we can run a quest together." Truth be told she's never played a RP game in her whole existence, but its 2027 and she's fairly tech savvy, so even she's picked up a few geeky-like references. She starts to backstep back toward her bike as the car passes on by and moves further down the street, for whatever reason she seems drawn to going after it.

Constantine has posed:
The incident in the alley attracts John's attention as well, but it's clearly muted in him. Not that he doesn't care about the happenings of a homeless fella, he's not completely heartless, but it's a city of situations like this one. If he jumped everytime the door slammed shut, he'd spend his whole life hoping around from foot to foot.

John Constantine is not a cat with a long tail in a room of rocking chairs.

But he notes Selene's interest easily enough. "You've the right hand on that pulse, dove." Quietly, alternating watching her watching the car and watching the car himself. Her attention on it isn't hard to keep tabs on, anyways.

"I'm just an old wizard, well past my questing days, but..." A wry grin plays on his face as she starts to back pedal towards her motorcycle, "For black leather one pieces and corsets on vampire pin-ups named Selene..." He nods once and fishes out his cigarettes to leave one between his lips. This time just using a lighter to ignite it, "I'll make an exception." He wiggles the fingers towards the car, clutching his smoke, "Have fun with those wanks, yeh? I suspect they wont have be having any at all, so someone should."