suitably_heroic | Around Atton's New York, All Day Tuesday

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Around Atton's New York, All Day Tuesday

So, Cade was still here. And... damned lucky that Dane had the patience of a saint (or at least a guy with crappy coping methods and a history of poor boundary-setting), or he probably would've been out on his ass by now. Hell, Jack had thought about throwing him out on his ass a few times now. The crossing the streams was just kind of weird.

And Cade could be kind of a jackass.

(But he'd also missed the guy and having him here was a good reminder of their misspent youth and space he really was getting old, wasn't he?)

Anyway.

It was show day. And Jack-slash-Atton hadn't slept a wink last night, so he'd just be on the floor of the living room, where he'd been for the last couple of hours. Ugh.

[[ for that guy and some ocd ]]

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The venue was pretty packed for a Tuesday. Couple hundred people maybe? Yeah, this was closer to the norm since the album came out than the twenty-to-forty folks they used to get, but if there was ever going to be a time where Jack didn't find that strange and surreal, this wasn't it. (They were also not, all Jack's joking in front of Cade aside, mostly teenagers. Twenty-somethings and thirty-somethings, some real metalheads in there.)

Ah, well. He peered out over the crowd one more time. Sought out Cade's Force presence for a sec, just to see if he hadn't wandered off to do something more exciting. No? Dammit.

Onto the stage it was.

He swaggered up to the microphone stand with a nonchalance he didn't feel, and smirked into the crowd. "Hey, glad you're coming out on a fucking Tuesday night to see us, of all people," he said. "Now, usually--" Trent's bass hummed through him for a sec, and he threw a glance over his shoulder. "Cool it for five more seconds!" Clear throat. "Usually, we start off this set with a cover. Usually, we pick something poppy to mangle with some distortion. But I'm not sure that fits the mood right now."

And there was Trent's bass again, hitting a rhythm in the background. Dark, but fast, and building. "So we're going to start with a classic." He swiped the microphone out of the stand with a Jedi-like elegance, and snapped, "You're keeping in step! And in line! Got your chin held high and you feel just fine--" A brief half-step, a slowing, like skipping over, and-- "'Cause you do. What you're told." --voice raising-- "But inside your heart it is black and it's hollow and it's cold!"

He skipped away from the microphone and launched himself wholesale into the song, hesitation forgotten. That was the thing about it. Jack had always tucked his feelings away for the Sith, to be brought out only to be used; then he'd become Atton and put on a good show of hiding them and only pulling out what he needed to keep up a front. Then there'd been the Jedi. He'd found himself drawn to Juyo, to the idea of taking that entire mess of pent-up emotions and throwing it into your hands and feet, walking up to the Dark Side as closely as you could without tipping over. Letting that fuel you.

Up here? He could do the same thing. Just without actual threat of lethal injury.

It fed into the crowd, too; one person threw a shove, another matched it, following the energy. A third, and then they had a fucking mosh pit. Maybe Jack-- Atton-- was putting it out there in the Force. Maybe he was feeding off it in the room. He didn't know.

"You want more of that?" he challenged as the beat died down, hair already clinging to his forehead. "Well, come back next week. Maybe we'll do a little Metallica for you. As a treat." Dane hit a loud chord behind him. He paced over the stage. "Come crawling faster! Obey your master!"

Cheering from the pit.

Jack laughed. "Next week," he said. "Now you're going to have to deal with one of ours, instead. You want sweet or do you want loud?"

More cheering.

"Well, that's not really conclusive," he said. He glanced over at Dane. "What do you think?" He slipped the microphone back into the stand.

"Feel like we gotta match Trent Reznor's energy for another beat," Dane called.

Jack gave a casual shrug. "We'll save the sugar for later," he said. Not that they hadn't already planned out this set. Not like Jill was already setting up an ominous, building, winding rhythm behind them. Not like Trent was getting ready with the guitar.

He leaned into the microphone. He smirked. "Oh, oh, you came out alive - again. Walked out the door upright when you could’ve died - again..."

And for a good forty-five minutes, Dane's guitar roared in anger and Trent's bass hit the melancholic notes and Jill's prog rhythms made things complicated and messy-- and Jack snarled and howled and softened and shoved all the tragedy of himself into stupid words in stupid music, where he didn't feel the need to minimize his own damage.

Edited 2025-03-19 12:47 (UTC)

And Cade lounged against a wall and drank, a bemused look on his face.

That rowdy guy in the crowd? Didn't so much mean to throw his beer at Cade, except it kind of went flying right over his head.

Cade wasn't going to use the Force when he could duck like a normal person, but now he was a normal person who smelled like cheap beer. "What the fuck?" he yelled.

"Sorry!" the man hollered, before leaping back into the pit.

"Hope is a dragon born from the shadows, luring his prey with fading light," Jack snarled into the microphone, backed by an extremely loud guitar.

Edited 2025-03-22 18:10 (UTC)

"Ugh," Cade grumbled, stripping his shirt off.

A thirty-something woman staggered out of the pit with a massive smile on her face, her hair sticking to everything. "AW YEAH!" she yelled.

And looked at Cade. "Aw yeah," she said. Nodding. "You comin' in?"

"No, I'm sticky enough!" Cade called back.

"Your loss!" she laughed, and retreated back into the pit.

The song cut off after the crescendo. Jack climbed down and sat on the edge of the stage, letting his legs dangle down as the rhythms of the drums and the low bass took them into something moodier. Ruefully, he sang, "I was lying on the floor with my heart on its ass and my mind firmly out of line... You pulled up this body with its pain plainly on display and sighed, 'You stupid motherfucker, you’re into too much angry shit.'"

It was the last song of the set, and yeah, Jack definitely felt a certain kind of grimly amused at singing, "Maybe I’m just fucking tired of doing the same stupid thing with the same stupid results" with Cade in the audience.

Not that he was being too pointed about it. Just, y'know. A hint.

Cade was aggressively not taking any hints via song lyrics. He was too busy trying to wipe the beer off of his shoulders with cocktail napkins.

It wasn't working.

Poor baby.

"You've been a great crowd," Jack called. "See you next week?"

The crowd - bar Cade - screamed happily in his direction.

"All right, now get the fuck out of here," he added. The lights dimmed. The band left the stage, and the crowd started to disperse.

Cade made sure to glare at Beer Throwing Dude until he left.

Beer Throwing Guy gave him the finger on his way out.

"You're a dick!" Cade yelled after him.

"So are you!" the man yelled back. "Rizzless dick!"

Better hurry to the exit, buddy.

So strange how Cade didn't move a step and yet that guy would feel like he'd gotten slapped in the back of the head.

So. Strange.

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Around Atton's New York, All Day Tuesday

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