victory_road | It's ALL the Rage [CLOSED]

Entry tags:

It's ALL the Rage [CLOSED]

Who: Carly Nagisa, and Dirk Strider

Where: Mahogany Town

When: Backdated to August 26th

What: Deciding not to bother with Serious Things, it's time for the best Distraction; buying questionable outfits that both think are Cool

Warnings: Who Let Them Pick Clothing

Mahogany is a lovely town. Carly's been spending just a short bit of time moving what few possessions she has to a new dorm there in fact, taking full advantage of certain perks. She likes it here. It's more peaceful- closer to nature without being in her cot-tent even. And if she wants to see the lake, she can just hike a little north!

It's perfect, and being so wrapped up in that perfection she actually forgot briefly about what had happened two weeks back with Dirk. (But after all, that Had happened, and it Had to be dealt with.)

He probably didn't believe her when she came out of a trinket store with her things and panicked out an excuse. He also probably didn't care much, which was something she liked about him honestly; he didn't ask questions about things that seemed too 'bothersome', which meant she didn't have to explain those things.

Granted, she probably asked far more questions than he liked, but perhaps that was the trade off. As it were, it was around then that they discovered a particular...Wardrobe deficiency that the man was 'suffering' from, which was why they were now outside a clothing boutique.

Nothing much- it was Mahogany after all- but perhaps for the same reason she had certain perks, it was large enough that they'd probably find everything they needed.

Plus Winter Clothing.

Carly herself seems rather torn between getting some fall wear herself, or simply continuing to save up for a ride pager. She decides instead to distract herself by focusing on Dirk. "Okay~! This place should have what we need! I suppose worst case we could double back to Goldenrod, but I'm wondering if they have to deal with 'Back to School' rushes right now..."

It is almost September after all.

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The thing about clothing is it's... just not been a priority for Dirk. The literal opposite, in fact. He has a change of clothes, and a few more changes of underclothes, and it's not like he neglects his personal hygiene. But just because he might be here for an indefinite amount of time doesn't mean he wants to settle down and get comfy with that idea.

So, okay, he's mostly been wearing the same anime ninja gear he found in his bag and the more modernised urban ninja aesthetic he'd been kicking around his space ship in.

Until now, that's been a perfectly serviceable arrangement.

But the cold...

No getting around it: Dirk hates, eschews, and is 100% not adapted to the cold.

But that's the only way through, and so.

"Let's just get this over with." He doesn't wait for Carly, pushing the door open with a short sigh that--honestly--doesn't reflect his feelings on fashion itself at all. It just reflects his feelings on the necessity of bending a knee to the purposeful nonsense of this game's design.

For Carly, clothing wasn't exactly a necessary priority so much as a necessary advantage. At the start of the summer she'd been told 'okay, we're billing it as work expense!'.

And well from there, she had to take as much advantage as made sense.

Seeing someone wearing the same thing over and over (And over!) again still didn't really click as an issue until she realized Dirk did not just happen to have three sets of the same outfit or something.

Thus, they are here. "Alright! I can even lead the way to the coat section, it's just this way...."

He starts out following her, because really he has no idea what he's doing and he knows it. Dirk has never actually shopped for clothes, or even obtained clothes in a manner where they didn't just appear out of nothing and/or nowhere, sized to fit. Between the wardrobifier and the ability to alchemise whatever else he wanted, it just never came up. Being in a store with a finite selection of sizes and styles, all of which are already just there... he is aware, academically, that this is how most people live, but it feels pretty alien.

Not that he'd say as much; it's not feigned confidence if he doesn't feel any shame.

His preoccupation with this basic foundational conflict pushes Carly's words into the mental distance, though, relegating her presence to the back of his thoughts. What does get his attention is a rack set into the wall, an accessory display nowhere near anything he actually needs.

He doesn't actually say anything to her about it, either--he just diverts to the side and disappears through the displays without a word.

Of course he's doing this. Of course.

Carly naturally doesn't notice he's missing right away- she's already almost at coats by the time she turns around in fact. "...anyway," she's saying, "What we really need to do is read the tags, because they'll really try to use brand names aga-"

....

She ultimately finds him by retracing her steps and peering as far over and around things as possible.

...

Hmmm. "...See stuff you like?"

Baseball caps are something of a loaded topic.

Dirk Striders (and a number of other, varied individuals who have to a greater or lesser degree of significance known or been Dirk Striders) have a complex history with what is undoubtedly one of mankind's most symbolic pieces of headgear.

He still covets the look. Why wouldn't he? But he knows about the man he shares that taste with... another Dirk, occupying another time and place in a parallel side of paradox space. Just a few short years ago, his manufactured inability to conveniently wear one had seemed a benediction, and he'd dropped the iconography in full. He didn't dare evoke the Dirk he didn't want to be.

It was a misleading gesture on his part. Both he and him had had always been non-discrete parts of the whole, essential elements of the overarching concept and execution and character of Dirk Strider.

It wasn't so much that one had become the other. He simply was what had already been inevitable, who he would inevitably be.

Carly's question isn't a surprise, exactly, but it's an interruption anyway. He feels jarred out of his own thoughts. Also, he doesn't really know how to answer it.

"I thought you were looking for coats."

"Ahhh..." Hooboy. "Well, we were looking for them for you right? I can't just pick a coat for you! You're the one who has to try it on! Make sure it feels right, and looks the way you want it!"

But! She does seem rather happy to have had to track Dirk down.

Strangely happy actually. "If you've got the change for it though, there's no harm getting some other stuff for yourself though!~"

"Try what on?" Dirk pulls his attention away from the hats long enough to ask that much; the crease between his brows is the sole visible sign that he is, in fact, genuinely confused.

He purposefully doesn't answer her about the hats.

"The coats! Not to mention anything else you want to get here. Aside from making sure stuff fits properly, you want to make sure the fabric feels the way you want it to, you know?"

She is aware that he is avoiding the question about the hats.

There's a beat or two where Dirk just stares at her with the kind of incomprehensible poker face that he's notorious for. His brows are barely visible above his shades, and the set of his mouth is only stern because there's nothing else for it to be when it's at rest.

The existence of clothes that don't fit isn't new; the possibility that he could actually purchase something for himself that doesn't fit him is a little bizarre. In the absence of any way to explain himself, he shrugs one shoulder noncommittally.

"Anything else I get. Like a hat." Okay, maybe he's pushing. Daring her a little. He doesn't have a good way to explain that either. He knows that if he just kept his mouth shut, she'd let the matter drop.

It'd just be too damn easy to just walk away and pretend this didn't happen. Except that he doesn't know if he's actually done here. Is he?

If he has to ask, maybe the answer is 'no.'

Without even appearing phased, Carly just holds her smile.

"Yep~!" Go for it Dirk. She won't judge.

Probably. "You just have to make sure everything is within budget~ Something like a hat probably won't cost much, but boots, and coats...those might cost you a bit more..."

Jesus. Can't a man have a crisis of the self in peace?

Dirk likes to think that he's a pretty practised hand at reading people, and that his skill lies in not just understanding but predicting what they're thinking and what they'll do. Carly is a bit confounding in that regard, however; sometimes it is sincerely hard to tell if she's thinking, let alone what she thinks.

"Yep, that's pretty much how a monetary economy works." What is he supposed to say to that?

"It's too bad my bro isn't here. I bet he'd love to discuss that with you."

No, Never. She just continues with that terrible smile, even while she turns. "Just making sure..! I don't know how your 'bro' shops, but it's really easy to get lost in the stuff you want to get and end up overspending... ...If you see something you like, even a little though, you should grab it to try on. The worst that'll happen is you have to put it back!"

"Yeah, that isn't what I meant at all." Or maybe it is. Maybe he set himself up, set Carly up, and even if she took the bait a little wrong, she still stepped on the trap's trigger just like he intended. Just like he knew she would. Okay, yeah, that's exactly what happened. That's who he is. Always one step ahead of his audience, two steps ahead of the game.

Three steps ahead of himself.

"Let's do this thing."

He wonders briefly if John would recognise the hat, or the man wearing it. He wonders if he'll recognise him.

"Let's make this shit work."

He barely gives colour a thought, snagging a black and grey cap and doffing it directly over his painstakingly styled hair. Then he realises there's a better one, and swaps that out for an almost-familiar magenta with orange lining under the bill.

It's less like ripping off a bandaid--which was incredibly underwhelming when he finally experienced it at seventeen--and more like... ripping out a line of stitches.

Somewhere in the back of his head, the script completes itself. Like a really fucked up invocation, a litany heard across paradox space, a paean to his Ultimate Self, written by the Strider to whom this particular idolatry is most graven.

where doign it man

where MAKING THIS HAPEN

There's a mirror on the wall, but he doesn't turn to look directly--just glimpses it sideways, and that's enough.

Yes yes of course it's not what he meant.

And naturally, he's having some sort of incredible Moment behind her as she leads the way to the coats. Hopefully he actually finds his way to the coats still, because Carly?

Has missed the entire thing. Completely.

Which is no doubt just the way that he likes it at this point.

Hey, sometimes Dirk wants or even needs an audience... hell, what's an author, what's a narrative without one? But that's fine, actually. Not that he wouldn't be setting the pace himself anyway, but this is between Dirk and the man in the mirror. First steeling himself, and then, underwhelming and overwhelming all at once, maybe it just averages out into the original, truer meaning of the word itself--

The act of looking into the mirror and standing face to face with himself in all his radical glory.

So he looks into the mirror and he sees the same face copied and pasted a thousand times, but the amalgamation of that face is a whole new man. Or is it? Is this a man who came before? Or a man yet to come?

Ha ha, j/k. There's no need to speculate. What's left to ask?

The man in the mirror is already here.

--

Goddamnit. Now he has the title theme from the Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff movie stuck in his head. The soundtrack was full of secret shit, like hidden sounds that when you made spectrographs of the music, made the Faces. Layers.

But Carly will at least find Dirk not too far behind her, but apparently he took a different route than she did, because while he's still wearing that two-toned cap, he's somehow also picked up a couple pairs of fingerless leather gloves, which he holds up briefly when he sees her spot him.

Then he flashes her a thumbs up, still stony-faced.

Edited 2019-09-15 00:57 (UTC)

"Ooo!" Well, at the very least she can show some appreciation for the gloves. "Nice pick~ Hand protection~!"

Sure, they'll go with that. As it is, Carly gestures to the very many, many coats around the few displays they're at. "Here we are at coats...not all of them have them, but most of these have a tag that says how much cold the coat can take before you start really feeling it...supposedly. Those are the tags you need to look for; it's really biting in there, worse than even a normal winter honestly...!" She shudders at the very thought.

Hand protection from what, though--it's not like he's going to be wielding any more swords. Not until he's already fucking gone. And it's the wrong time of year for fancy Santas. Assuming they even have Santas, fancy or otherwise.

Fuck. Whatever.

"So my options are either to freeze my ass off or look like a beach ball leaking air. Fantastic. Let's get started."

Who knows. Road rash? Pokeball rash?

As it is. "Mmmh, you'd be surprised how much some of the smaller jackets can keep contained actually- it's all about the fabric. Which...is also important, since you want it to look comfortable...so see this one?" She holds one up- obviously not intending for Dirk to take that one, but more so she can show the tag compared to the size.

"This one's not too thick, but it still has a pretty good threshold...you'd probably only have to wear a sweater under it..!" Pretty neat, in her opinion.

Dirk has never worn a sweater in his life, and the first people he can think of who do wear them are Rose (not his style) and Ford Pines (no thanks.) What's left? He scans the racks of coats with his eyes, then starts to move forward, weaving through them in a seemingly-purposeful fashion. He pauses to flip over a tag occasionally, and it quickly becomes obvious he's only looking at coats that are A. single-layered, B. not some kind of shiny nylon, and C. white or black.

A coat over a sweater... she puts it in really unattractive terms, but he's starting to get an idea.

Dirk's gonna learn. Otherwise Dirk's gonna Die.

Carly remains relatively hands off though. She's gotten her own coat, and ultimately she's more here to make sure Dirk doesn't pick up something Truly Stupid. So he should ultimately be free to pick something he likes.

...Hopefully that. Works. At least.

It's probably not much of a secret that Dirk's original intention was to find whatever he could tolerate and get the hell out of dodge. It's also probably not much of a secret at this point that this is not going to be a quick in and out at all. Dirk's... picky. Unsurprisingly. Or maybe surprisingly--

Either way, he paces around the racks with a look on his face that clocks somewhere just past the base marker for 'serious' and heading towards 'severe.' It's silent in their corner for a good while before he speaks.

"Let me ask you a question. I'm not asking you to let me, by the way, I'm asking it and figuring out the rest when you answer. Or don't. It goes like this: the very first time we spoke, don't know if you remember, but you held out for a truly impressive amount of time on the subject of bike-riding. It was practically a filibuster for the bicycle propaganda lobby. An absolute oratory on the economics of the old-fashioned two-wheeled device." The jackets he's looking at have a thick, removable inner lining and a layer of dense but thin padding underneath the first exterior layer. They're surprisingly heavy, and have an excess of buckling. He's kind of digging it.

"So I passed a motion, which I'm titling right now, it's called 'Horses are Motherfucking Awesome,' and presented it with exhibit A: the bare existence of the great outdoors."

It'd be nice to say he's doing this on purpose, drawing this out to get a read on Carly's reaction, but... honestly he's just filling the space between his thoughts, his words, and where he has to keep backing up or accelerating his thoughts to line them back up. It's a bad habit.

"It was like you'd never fucking heard of grass. Which is pretty interesting, because if there's one thing this place isn't short of, it's goddamn grass."

He pauses. He doesn't turn, because he's pretty sure this will be more effective if he keeps his back to her, like this is nothing to him.

"Now for the actual question. What gives?"

A question? Carly brings her attention back to Dirk as he says that, only to find herself momentarily confused as she listens. As usual, Dirk seems to be building something. A mood maybe. Some kind of energy. She's not really sure, but it's something- she vaguely recalls the conversation.

The more he talks about the conversation, the more she remembers- and the more she sputters in beet red. "Th- That..!"

"I hadn't seen the grass yet..!" she admits freely, huffing. "I didn't expect to see grass as tall as my waist everywhere- that took me until the end of the first route to hit..!"

Well. Not Route 1, of course but still.

"Yeah. That's the thing. It didn't exactly take a long time to learn that everyone starts out here in the same place. There's a set spawn point."

Mom's house. Dirk isn't touching how fucked up that is. Not this conversation, anyway.

He's gone back to perusing the coat rack as he talks, giving his hands something to do while he lays out his foundation. If it's a building, then each word is an individual brick. But he likes to think of this as more of a wall, Cask of Amontillado style.

He lets go of the sleeve on a coat much too big for him anyway, the tag swinging loose from its end as it settles. He turns around.

He cocks one thick brow expertly. It rises above the rim of his shades. His voice, however, flatlines.

"Doesn't matter where you turn from there. The very first things you see are trees, grass, more trees and grass."

If she doesn't know where this is going by now--

"Spill it."

"Mmmmhnnnmmhmnhnmmnnnn..." Carly's mouth might just fly right off her face if she keeps making these sounds and chewing her lip in the same motion, but it's a bit hard not to when she's being called out so dramatically. Did he practice this??

He probably didn't, and that's the worst part.

"I woke up in Goldenrod, okay!" she finally hisses, keeping her voice as low as she can. "The routes around Goldenrod don't have grass for hours..!"

No, he did not practise this. He just has a real knack for making his timing look purposeful. His resting douche face and quiet monotone helped. Now, instead of blatantly covering for the fact that he was voicing these thoughts out loud for the first time by pretending to be interested in a coat rack, it looked like something ominous. Intimidating, even.

And who's to say that wasn't purposeful? Dirk is fully aware of the effect he has on people. Especially the people who don't know better.

"Goldenrod," he repeats, but does her the courtesy of lowering his voice. This has the side effect of putting him barely above an audible whisper; he finds it hard enough to maintain the volume other people naturally adopt when speaking, making himself even quieter means Dave mumbles louder than he talks.

"Why Goldenrod? Where in Goldenrod? If you say 'Dad's,' I'm going to lose my absolute shit, by the way."

What's in Goldenrod? How do you even start? That's not even close to the level you start at. You'd be absolutely destroyed trying to walk out the gate, in any direction.

Edited 2019-10-05 20:20 (UTC)

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A small one but--

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Dirk: Have Some Kind of Fucking Religious Experience

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And after I went through all that trouble to figure out Comic Sans on DW too,

shes so ungrateful :'[

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My phone doesn't think cask is a word and keeps changing it to cast???

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