meadowlarklogs | I CAN'T IMAGINE THERE'S A WAY

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I CAN'T IMAGINE THERE'S A WAY —

WHO: Fitz, SHIELD, and you!
WHERE: New Amsterdam's medium-est bar: Refraction
WHEN: 01 September
WHAT: Leo's turning 31 100
NOTES OR WARNINGS: TBA

[ On his actual birthday, Fitz celebrates with his two closest friends (the people who’ve kept him together, despite wobbles along the way). Bobbi and Daisy, however, know that when Fitz says I hate people and don’t want to celebrate in the middle of a secret war he means I hate being alone, even on days without symbolic meaning. Daisy and Bobbi send out the mass evite, and Bobbi uses her powers of persuasion to find a more upscale venue for a discounted rate. Due to the flipped schedules in the height of New Amsterdam’s summer, Fitz’s party happens in the morning (the new night for anyone working a 9-5 gig), sun rising high over the city as it begins.

Welcome to REFRACTION, a classy bar tens of floors off the ground, with a stellar view of the city, not far from the river. Beams of light weave across the back area of the venue, well-lit by various glowing fixtures. Something about the place has an old world flair, with its dark colour scheme and minimalist decor. Maybe today’s an acceptable excuse to dress smart, celebrate with a friend, and drink up:

— enjoy the food (which might have had British roots at one point, but it’s hard to tell given the variety of fusions on display in bite-size portions) and initial round of free fizz, compliments of the host (and the host’s super stem friends)
— buy drinks at the bar and get wankered (as the birthday boy will be, around the new midnight)
— people watch from the tables and sofas
— dance to NA’s top synth pop hits (coming through hidden speakers above and holograms of the singers at some tables, activated by the proximity of nearby implant viewers)
— try a piece of cake, reading Happy 100th Birthday, Fitz! and looking a bit like it came from the same space-themed, child's birthday do as the evite. If your piece of cake has a wee star inside it, it means you’re one of the lucky winners and get a freebie at the bar.

As a nice establishment, rowdiness will only get you tossed on your arse by the bouncers, so everybody be cool.

At one point, someone nudges Fitz forward to say something. Dressed in his finest blues, he cuts a smarter figure than the usual corporate cut-out. ]

Right. [ said in the tight voice of someone who is definitely on the verge of crushing the flute in his hand. ] I never know what to say, and I didn't have time to prepare because, ah. Surprise. [ he splays out his free hand. ] So I will just say that — that there's someone I wish was here, despite all the horrible happenings, but that I am so so grateful that you're all here despite them, too. It's not for — forever, but it's pretty nice. Right now. [ As another SHIELD agent said: We have what we have when we have it. That's it. ] Thank you. Cheers!

( if you don't think the SHIELD losers would have invited your character, please feel free to come up with a semi-plausible reason for attending. gatecrashing, plus ones, hearing the commotion and wanting to be nosy. all are welcome! )

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[If only Clarke had thought to bring her stylus, she would have been bold enough to do what Markus is doing now. Most of her art has been rather private since coming here, done on digital canvasses most of the time, but some physically, thanks to the supplies that she and Loki stole from an art supply delivery truck. Even then, much of that has been far more involved than anything she's done back home. Going from sketches to a bigger canvass, to working with colors on cloth, is an immediate difference. She's had to learn.

Her eyebrows lift when Markus asks her to say still, and she draws her arm back to where it was mere seconds before, a smile flickering over her lips.]

You'll show me when it's done?

[Clarke hopes it's not too much to ask for. She knows that she can be rather private, as stated before. And she doubts that Markus is much more accustomed to this style of art. Though maybe he is—it's hard for her to tell what it was like for Markus to have been Markus before. All she knows is him as he is now.]

[He gives her a smile of appreciation from where he sits, at a table diagonal to hers, just barely neighboring Clarke's own seat. Her chosen perch is accidentally a perfect one, at least where compositions are concerned; the bar light is acting as a frame against her form, casting her in a halo of amber illumination that flirts with transitioning into a full silhouette.

Markus continues to flick his eyes between her and some invisible space unseen just in front of him, that split-attention look in his gaze telling of someone focused on images existing in the digital landscape. Another movement of a hand, a few hurried, vertical sweeps.]

I'll show you now, if you like? You deserve that much for me not even telling you what I was doing.

[But sometimes inspiration strikes, and he follows its guidance, its impulsivity. Yet in the next moment, Markus' implant is asking for permissions from hers to share the art program between them; he's not shy about it, even when most artists would hesitate to display something incomplete.]

[All the times that Clarke has scrambled to take back a sketch book come back to her now. Markus' lack of hesitation is hardly surprising. If nothing else, it's to be admired—another way that Markus' steadiness and self-assured certainty when it comes to himself comes to the forefront. It's just so strikingly different from how she'd handle it—least of all because she's sketched enough people without asking them herself.

Her surprise is marked just the same, but passes soon enough as she processes that Markus is being himself. Typical Markus. Which only has good connotations, as far as she's concerned. She grants him permission, a thing that's all too easy thanks to the fact that she has the program herself.]

It's not always easy to ask. Especially not now. We can be much subtler with it. ["We." Further confirmation. They haven't had much of a chance to talk about art before. Other things kept coming up.]

[So much have they spoken of serious matters -- of their homes, of leadership, of the nature of what's expected of them as a result -- that they've never sat down to focus on the little things. On interests that lie beyond keeping their ragtag group of interdimensional human trafficking victims solidified and informed.

On art. A subject held near and dear to this android's now-human heart.]

There's only so much subtlety you can subsist on when it comes to art. Sometimes you have to be a little shameless about when and who you sketch; you can't control when inspiration strikes.

[(Typical Markus, indeed.)

In the next moment the digital canvas that he's been drawing and painting on shimmers to life, and Clarke would view the piece as Markus sees it. Head-on, any changes he makes reflecting in her vision in real-time. He hasn't even locked access to the actual work-in-progress; she could pick up her own virtual brush and add a stroke here or there, if she wanted.

And what's displayed is her seated, of course. That's quite clear, her figure situated at the composition's center.

But it's the luminescent glow behind her that infuses it with life, with artistic rendition that amplifies the beauty and surreality alike. Cast in hazy and golden hues, her body is framed by light and the clean, dark curvatures of the bar. The details have already been put into her expression -- pensive, focused on something beyond the confines of the digital canvas -- which reveals Markus' preference: portraying people, figures, trying to bottle up their essences in a single, handcrafted moment.]

What do you think?

[For a moment, Clarke looks exactly as she does in the painting: pensive and a little distant, like she's trying to solve the world's problems. Right now, it's just a matter of taking in the lines and embellishments. While he doesn't withhold access to the canvas, it never occurs to her to include some input herself. By being the centerpiece of it, she's already involved—anything else would feel like intruding.

After Clarke came down from the Ark in the dropship, she never had much of an opportunity to see herself through other people's eyes. Or through photographs or anything else. That's changed here. Mirrors abound, and yet—there's something about seeing herself this way. Through someone else's eyes.]

You have a way with bringing out a scene with color. [She likes it, and likes it more that it comes from Markus' hand. It's unique, like seeing into someone else's understanding.

Clarke knows that half her art lately has been pictures of friends she won't see for a long time, if ever again. Her mother, too. Sometimes her father. They're hidden away, mementos from her own hand. A lot of that is getting used to the medium at hand.]

I like it. I like seeing how you've chosen to ... [It's hard to word it, exactly.] Well, you don't always have this opportunity to see yourself at the end of someone else's pen.

No. I’ve never had the opportunity, either.

[Never had his own portrait taken or drawn, he means, never having a chance to indulge in anything art related until he was torn from home and given actual hours in the day to utilize as he wished. There was irony in that, surely — of being able to indulge himself in something he enjoys, departed from Detroit. He’d almost take pleasure in this fact, if not for the fact that being so far from his responsibilities, his role, was not a burden unto itself.

A streak of “paint” follows the curve of the bar, Markus willing it once more with a hand. Amber highlights reflecting off of smooth, lacquered edges.]

I’d like to see some of your own work someday. If you wouldn’t mind it.

I—[she begins, only to realize that she might be crippled, prevented from sharing. Clarke would like to curate it, but that's easier said than done. She wishes her art looked as good as it did to her on paper, casting bits of gray shading along the edge of her left hand as she sketches lines into life. Digital art is so different, and what happens with her hands now is still just as different, the art of sketchbooks lost to a world that, like her own, didn't take care of itself.

(ALIE just accelerated a long-identified problem. Climate problems. They're an issue.)]

One moment. [Clarke knows he can sense the hesitation. But she moves into the cloud where her art is saved, sending over a couple of recent works. Her art is sketchy in nature, with lines less poorly defined, meant to outline someone as she uses shading to bring them to life. There is some experimentation there, but no color: all blacks and whites, as if the world only exists in those colors.

They don't, obviously. Or rather: the world isn't devoid of color, but it says a lot about Clarke's upbringing that it often felt that way.

One piece is of Bellamy, strands of dark hair piling over his forehead, lips cast into a frown. Serious and distant. The other is of people in a park. A familiar one, at that. Even though the place has come to hold some dark memories for Clarke already, she still escapes there even now, trying to find some solitude and peace.]

It's ... I'm still adjusting. It often feels like the pen doesn't do what I need it to do. I've tried all the settings and it's the same. The lines are too defined.

[Markus had no experience with digital art until his arrival in New Amsterdam, though it remains difficult to know if he’s more attuned to it by way of being an android. The interface isn’t as alien to him as it should be, the math and algorithms working to convey paint or charcoal or graphite on a canvas perhaps more comforting than not.

But he’s still like her — still prefers the traditional. The tooth of the paper protesting against dry and wet media. The canvas being a physical, flat surface in front of him. The feel of a sketchbook in his hands, one day, would be just as nice.

Her hesitation is clear, and he wonders if she’s self-conscious about what he’ll see. But when the black-and-white art is brought up, details highlighted with light and shadow the only way black-and-white can do, he sees no reason why she should be. There’s evidence of unsure lines here and there, but Markus’ own sketches can harbor those too, in warm-ups before he finds his footing.]

I like them.

[He recognizes the skypark, and he recognizes Bellamy. A focus on the familiar.]

Black and white forces you to focus strictly on shape and form, defined by shadow. A clear, undistracted way of viewing the world. You do that well.

[He peers ‘behind’ her displayed work to glance over at Clarke.]

Though, if you’re looking to work with traditional mediums, I have an extra canvas or two back at the apartment. And an excessive amount of paint. I can spare some, for a fellow artist.

Really? [Clarke brightens. Canvases haven't been the easiest to come by. That's not because they don't exist, but because they weren't a part of her stolen art supplies run. Money is a thing that she's very careful about, even more so since Bellamy disappeared, leaving her wondering about what she would do in his absence. The two of them were working this out together.

The fact that they're no longer working it out is difficult. Hard for Clarke in particular.]

I'll have to come by. Loki and I—let's say that we had a run for some supplies ourselves. [Markus can assume this was illegal, but legality is a tricky thing. Clarke only cares about not breaking laws when the end result is sure to harm someone involved.] So, I'll let you see some of what I have. I haven't even opened most of it because ... well ... [Where would she even use it?]

Really.

[Prone to indulging a little bit in the gladness of others, Clarke's eagerness pulls wider at his smile.]

Bring your supplies over sometime. Or... [Well, illegal acquisition of supplies or not, Markus will not be the one to question what's already transpired. And it would be a shame not to utilize what she has, if her interest and artistic inclinations are so strong.]

...we can be painfully cliche and find a place at the skypark, sit and paint the landscape. [A threat of a laugh in his words; cliche or not, such is what Artists Do.] It'd be a nice outing for a change.

[A return to the park. Standing in sunlight. With how warm it's been, it may not be a good idea, but Clarke's experienced worse, moving across the sands of wasteland, hoping that she might be able to conjure up some water or save enough to get through another day. She can handle this. While restricted, water is still available. There is that.]

I'll bring the supplies, including some water. If we time it right, there won't be anyone there. We can take advantage of the lighting. [With everyone asleep, they can be at peace, drawing without gawking eyes.

Unless he would like that. Clarke wouldn't fault him, but sharing her art is still very new. It's territory she's still exploring.]

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I CAN'T IMAGINE THERE'S A WAY —

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