entrancelogs | You know, there ain't no rest for the wicked. Money don't grow on trees!

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You know, there ain't no rest for the wicked. Money don't grow on trees! | OPEN

Who: Stan Pines [

charlastan] and YOU!
Where: Anywhere on Genosha, but mostly the sketchier parts of the city.
When: 8/5 - 8/9
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Stan's lived a pretty rough life on Genosha, despite being a mutant. He doesn't look like a mutant at a glance and doesn't have obviously provable powers, so he's fallen into a life of hard crime to get by and now...now, he's watching his great-niece and nephew. And an extra litter of illegally smuggled laser puppies.
The Story:

A. Dead End Flats - Stan's Shitty Apartment - 8/5/16 (Closed to Dipper and Mabel)

"¡Escuchen! ¿Qué demonios se supone que debo hacer con esta cantidad de perros?! Vas a tomar todos ellos o te rompo todos los huesos del cuerpo! ...Hello?"

[Stan stares at the phone in his hand and then slams it on the receiver. Great. The guy hung up on him and now he's going to be out twelve grand. More importantly though, his suppliers are going to be out another twelve grand, and if he doesn't scramble and get it to Rico soon he's gonna send his goons out to try and rough him up. Normally he could take it, but...he's got a couple of kids staying with him, and they don't need to see that side of his life.

The contraband in question, is a box of puppies of indeterminate species at his feet, mutts that normally wouldn't sell for any considerable amount. Stan glares down at them and while most of them are unmoved, a couple yip excitedly and shoot lasers from their eyes. This gets all the others going, and Stan ducks for cover.]

No! No! Bad dogs! Uhh...

[He looks around for something to help stop them from shooting holes in the few things he owns, and eventually settles for dumping out a garbage can and sticking it over the puppy box.]

There! Problem temporarily solved! [A beat, and then he calls out to Dipper and Mabel.] KIDS! WHO WANTS TO TAKE A PUPPY HOME AND NEVER TELL THEIR PARENTS HOW THEY GOT IT?

B. Downtown, some alley in a shopping district - 8/6/16 (OPEN)

[There's still a good amount of puppies left, and he's gotta get rid of them as fast as possible. If his seller ain't gonna take them, then he'll have to do it himself and mark them up to make it worth his while. He's set up in a dark alley, with an refrigerator box turned on its side full of puppies running around and shooting red lasers from their eyes at the sides of the buildings around them.

Stan's just glad they haven't realized they could cut right through the box if they wanted.

He spends a lot of time watching the crowd of shoppers. It's probably mostly mutants, not so much because of how they look, but because no human Stan knows has the kind of cash to spend in a place like this. He's also well aware that he doesn't look like he belongs here either, with his torn-up coat and ratty clothes. At least he's got a good sturdy pair of boots, but they're always filthy.

He's equally aware that everyone who looks at him assumes he's powerless, assumes he's human unless someone actually believes him when he tells them otherwise. Frankly, it's just made him stop spending the effort trying to explain. Besides, it always makes it him feel better to sucker people that assume the worst of him.

A lot of his time is spent leaning against a wall loitering, but when he spies someone he thinks he can sell to, he stops them in their tracks.]

Say pal, why you here all by yourself? You look like exactly the sorta person who could use their own animal companion! One with unique breeding, I should add. [Obvious code for "Mutant-born" animals.] You, uh-- wanna take a look? ...You're not a cop, right? No cops allowed. Them's the rules.

C. In your dreams - any night (OPEN)

[At night is when Stan's powers truly come to life. Ever since he was a young boy, he's been able to manipulate and traverse the mindscape, altering his own dreams and the dreams of others. He can even alter his own appearance in dreams, making himself look any way he wants to, or hiding himself as needed.

But when he was a boy, his powers did not extend far at all - just to the nearest sleeping form, who was always Ford. As a result, no one believed him when he said he had powers too. No one except Ford.

Once his father threw him out (for being a good-for-nothing dead-weight human who would never be able to make a living, let alone a fortune) he started to practice with his abilities more. Now...now, he's not sure how far they extend, honestly. He's tried to figure it out by trying to remember whose dream he's in and figuring out where they live (or at least where they usually sleep), but it's tough to tell. Essentially he has to skip from one person's dream to the next. They're all connected within the mindscape, but he has to pass through the dreams of the person across the street to get to the dreams of someone on the next street over, and so on and so forth.

The farthest he's managed to travel thus far, as far as he can tell, has been two miles. But he always tries to leave himself enough time to get back to his own dreams - if he doesn't make it back to his own head before he wakes up, he's tugged back forcefully across town and wakes up with a killer migraine.

He can't help himself though - there's always that itch to use his power when he's asleep, since he can't when he's awake. So, Stan wanders around a little most evenings, seeing what dreams are lurking in the minds of those around him. Occasionally he pays people visits, either friendly social calls or attempts to plant ideas in the minds of people who could be swayed to buy things from him, but often he tries to go unnoticed. That...doesn't always work out as planned though.]

D. In BILL'S dreams - 8/8/16 (Closed to Bill Cipher)

[Stan's still disoriented from trying to separate himself from this...this weird life the event's given him and what his actual memories are. But despite that, he's okay. He's reorienting himself, and he's fine. It's just more Wonderland bullshit; what else is new? ...Aside from the weird ache of the hardships of a life that wasn't even real. The same can't be said of Ford though. The guy's falling apart and Stan is livid.

So, possibly against better judgement, he's out for petty revenge while he can get it.

It takes him a long time to find Bill - he wasn't sure where the guy was living in this stupid event, and it's been hell trying to find his way. He'd gotten used to the general rhythms of the dreams of his neighbors and their weird patterns, but now that everyone is starting to remember their dreams have been changing to accommodate.

Eventually though, he steps into a dream that feels like it might be the one. He slips himself into the shadows and waits for either an opportunity to strike, or a sign to move on to another dream instead. But he's got a pretty good feeling about this one, and he's gotten pretty far trusting his terrible instincts already.]

E. Other - Whenever (OPEN)

[ooc: Got something else you want with Stan? Toss it here anyway!]

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[All the copies act independently of each other, and in that respect they look more like sextuplets than copies. Some shout after the jerks as others start to put their flames away and brush themselves off, and one just wails on a straggler until they manage to pull themselves away and run off with the other bullies.

When Frisk speaks though, they all look up at them. The surprise is enough to break Stan's focus, and the six of them fuse back together into one Stan. He decides in that split second to leave himself as a kid though, instead of turning back into a gross old man. This kid's already scared enough as it is!

He shrugs, like it's something anyone would have done. It's something anyone should have done.]

Eh. I was just passin' through and you looked like you needed a hand or twelve.

[He laughs a little at his own dumb joke, and then looks at them a little more seriously.]

...You okay?

Edited 2016-08-09 01:20 (UTC)

[Someone just...acted like that out of the goodness of their heart. Showing something like mercy, just because they could? That doesn't just happen, does it? Do people do that?

Evidently they do, their savior included. Their...seemingly-superpowered savior. They wonder vaguely what kind of powers that gives him - they've heard of powers manifesting at every age. Maybe mirror imaging? Duplication? They can't guess, and their mind hasn't adjusted to the fact that this is happening in their subconscious just yet.

Frisk gets to their feet, achingly slow, as if expecting him to suddenly change tack and push them down. But he doesn't, and they stand, back on their feet.]

Yeah.

[They're a little banged up, but when aren't they? They scrub at their face, trying to rub away the dirt stains and tear tracks, but achieve little besides spreading the grime over a wider surface area.]

I mean, I am now. Um...how'd you do that? Are you - you're one of them, aren't you?

[Stan watches, to make sure they're alright, but he lets them get up on their own. Sometimes that feels important.]

What, a Mutant? Yeah. It's uh. Kinda weird to explain? I can do a lotta stuff though! Like here, lemme get that--

[He waves his hand in front of their face, even though he's a good foot or two away from them, and just like that the grime wipes off like it's nothing.]

There ya go! [He smiles wide at first, but...it fades.] ...Since it's not somethin' I can prove most of the time, I used to get a lotta jerks like that too. People sayin' I was "broken" or "screwed up" just 'cause I couldn't use my powers on command.

[He avoids saying what those powers actually are, not so much because he wants to keep it a secret, but because he doesn't trust that they will lucidly dream once they know what's happening, and he doesn't want to get knocked back to his own head from them waking up. There have been too many times when he's flat-out said "you're dreaming" and it was enough to make them jolt awake and hurtle him across town.]

[The scabs, the dirty bandages, the dirt and scuffed knees and scraped elbows and banged shins - it all dissolves in a heartbeat. Frisk blinks, staring at their hands as they turn them this way and that, as if inspecting them for visible damages. That's...incredible. Healing and duplication and who knew what else?]

Th-thank you. You...you're really...

[Talented? Multi-talented? They're not sure how to quantify what his powers are, their subconscious mind yet to latch onto the fact that this is a dream just yet.

He hasn't explained what those powers are. That hasn't escaped their notice, though they're too grateful to press for details - for now.]

I hate it. I hate it when people do that. Hate you 'cause you're different. 'Cause you're not what they think you should be.

[They sound bitter, huh. Maybe they should.]

[Being someone with a relatively low sense of self-worth, Stan genuinely can't imagine what would fill in that blank. He's really what? Weird, probably. That's always how it is when he interrupts other people's dreams.]

Right?! Ugh...and they never wanna listen. They just go around thinkin' whatever they want and when you try and tell 'em "No, really! I'm a mutant! I'm one of you guys!" they never believe it! At least, that's how it always when I was a--

[--a kid, but crap he looks like a kid right now.]

--I mean. ...That's how it's always been for me.

[It's not even really a lie - life hasn't gotten much easier, now that he's older.]

[They make a face in sympathy, though they're not really sure where his sentence was heading before he trails off. Frisk eyes him curiously. They could ask, maybe. But he - he saved them from those jerks, and then he healed them, and they owe him, don't they?

They...yeah. It wouldn't be right to press him for information when they're the one who owes him. They fold their arms over their middle in a motion that's meant to display their disgruntled agreement, but ends up being more of a testament to their own insecurity.]

It's not like you should have to prove it. Or like they should treat you like that anyway. Just 'cause you've got powers no one knows about -

[A strange expression crosses their face. Powers? Powers. Powers, that's right, they have powers. They're not human at all, they're a mutant. So why didn't they remember their powers just now...?]

[Stan finds himself mirroring the move, crossing his arms in front of himself. It's something he tends to default to when talking about uncomfortable things, an unusually easy tell on him.]

Yeah, well it's not like--

[It's not like anyone else thinks that way, but the thought dies in his mouth when he sees that look come over them. It's hard to read, but it makes him stop long enough to ask about it.]

...Uh. You alright there?

I just remembered that I have powers too. I have - why didn't I use them?

[They can do what only one other person in the whole island can! They can create that point in time, their SAVE point. Go back to it, try again! They're - they're not human at all.

They're not human at all.

Frisk glances behind them, at the spot in the dirt where they'd been lying moments before, seemingly helpless. Crying wolf, pretending to be hurt when they weren't, really.

You don't know what suffering is. You will never know what suffering is.]

Why didn't I remember...?

[Ah, lucidity is coming to them, at least a little bit. Stan doesn't seem very surprised by this revelation, and he shrugs.]

Oh, is that all? It's prolly just 'cause this is a dream.

[There's no point in trying to keep it a secret when they're starting to notice things are off. Either they'll stay lucid or start to wake up and Stan doesn't really have any say in the matter, so he might as well just blurt it out.]

People's memories and sense of time get messed up in dreams all the time, so it's not you. It happens to everyone, I think -- everyone except me.

It's -

[With a rending, bright snap of multiple edges aligning, it all pieces together. Their lack of powers, the faceless nature of their bullies, the way this boy can do all sorts of things on a whim -

And they're not eight either. They blink, and they're slightly taller, as if their mind sense the disconnect between the dream and their physical age and abruptly adjusted.]

It is a dream. That makes...a lot of sense now, actually. Th - thank you.

[Which begs the question of how he knows. He can replicate himself, he can heal them with a thought, he says he has powers that aren't overt, he's talking like he has some kind of intimate knowledge as to how dreams work...

Well, they can do some basic deductive reasoning. Frisk looks at him curiously.]

Is that your power? Dreams, and things?

Edited 2016-08-21 06:42 (UTC)

[Stan finger-guns at them and makes a clicking noise with his tongue.]

You got it! I walk around other people's dreams! It's actually kinda cool? I can look like whatever I want to in here, and even have whatever powers I want...except, uh. It only works when I'm asleep, on other people who're asleep.

[Surely they can see the dilemma there. You can't exactly prove a power that requires everyone involved to be unconscious. During the day he's entirely and completely powerless.]

That would be hard to prove.

[In the same their own powers had been difficult to class, and why they'd given up on trying to convince certain people of their existence. It gives them an advantage, in any case - the power to repeat conversations infinitely until they get the desired result.

It largely goes unrecognized, unless there's someone with a power similar enough to theirs in the vicinity who can recognize it.]

Well, it was...it was really nice of you to make this a better dream than it was. I get that nightmare a lot.

[That was possibly more information than he needed; they were probably resigned enough to their fate for him to infer it well enough.]

[Stan's...never really dealt with compliments well. Mostly because they've been so rare throughout his life that when someone actually has one for him, he always feels like they must be talking about someone else, even when they couldn't possibly be.

He wonders if making himself a child is amplifying those feelings somehow. It feels as intense as it did when he was young, that sense that he doesn't deserve to have good things said about him.]

Uhh. Really, it's nothin'. Reoccurring dreams happen to a ton of people, and I just happened to be here, so...a-and it's not like I could've just stood and watched that! Anyone who would've is a real jerk!

[He wants to keep insisting that anyone would have stepped in and helped, but he knows that's not true. He knows that from experience.]

[That kind of protest sounds familiar. Like an old - an old friend, hah. Someone who insisted that they would never do something out of the goodness of their heart, because that alleged goodness never existed. That anyone would have helped, and it says nothing about the content of their character if they didn't just stand there and watch something horrible happen to someone innocent.

It's just as unconvincing now as it was then. Frisk smiles faintly.]

And I bet you didn't have to heal me and help me afterwards either, huh?

[They've got your number.]

Edited 2016-08-22 05:57 (UTC)

[Stan stubbornly crosses his arms and puffs up one cheek, but he can't seem to look directly at them.]

Nope! 'Cause you would've figured out this was a dream eventually, and it's not like you're hurt out in the real world. I just...y'know. I was here. You were dream-hurt. It's not that big a deal.

[Except that he feels like he's making it into a bigger deal the more he protests about it, but he's sticking to his guns here.]

[Their expression softens into something more quietly amused, and they shake their head, counting off on their fingers.]

Just like anyone would've assured me this was just a dream, or made me feel better, and understood what it's like to have powers you can't prove. Nothing at all helpful or kind about that, right?

[It sends a shuddering pang through their chest to remember the last person they'd spoken to like this, the ache of longing for a happier time. Funny how they never get to dream about that instead.]

Uhh. Well...

[He shifts uncomfortably, and some of the irritation fades away in favor of just awkwardness. They keep going on about how nice he is, what a good guy he is, and he knows he's NOT, but--

--but he's going to lose his grip if he keeps obsessing over that. He can feel it a little as his hair starts to turn gray, but he takes a deep breath. It's enough for him to refocus, and his hair floofs back up brown.

What does he say though? He rubs the back of his neck and searches for words.]

...Thanks, I guess? People don't usually say stuff like that about me so...it's nice of you, I guess.

[There. It's nice of them to say it, but that doesn't mean they're right. He can handle that much.]

[Frisk doesn't notice immediately that something's off until it's already shifted back. Maybe it was just...the dream being dreamlike? Yeah, probably. They changed ages midway through the dream, so it's not so big.]

Well, you did help me out of a tight spot. I mean, it was a dream tight spot, but it still wasn't a lot of fun. So, you know. I owe you.

[Then they frown, chewing on their lower lip. He mentioned that his powers weren't overt, so maybe he got kind of a hard time from other mutants? It's certainly possible.]

I can put in a good word for you when I wake up - at my job, I mean.

[He's about to tell them that they don't really need to do that, that they might not even remember this when they wake up, but...the offer actually makes him pause and stare at them. Did he misjudge? Are they not really a kid?]

...Oh? Uh. ...What's your job?

[He doesn't wat to get his hopes up. There's not a whole lot they can do for him, probably. He's a criminal; his record would get in the way.

He knows that, but there's still a flicker of hope that he can't bring himself to snuff out.]

Um, I work at...well, I'm kind of the Littlest Ambassador.

[They say it with no small amount of self-deprecation, as it's a nickname they've had thrown at them by plenty of older members of government, people who look down their noses at someone so small having made their way up the higher echelons of Public Relations.]

I mean, I...work with the Genoshan government. Try to, um, keep peace between humans and mutants and stuff.

[Honestly, if they're so lucid, Stan would be questioning all of this as just part of the dream. People say all kinds of weird stuff in their dreams. But this seems like it might actually be true, so color Stan surprised.]

Huh! Uh, good for you, I guess. I mean, to me that sounds like they're just saddlin' one of the hardest jobs in the city on a kid, but...at least you've got it good.

[He's from one of the roughest parts of the city and lives among criminals. Peace is something they all laugh at - they're too bitter and too burned to believe in it.

...It finally occurs to him how weird that must be coming from a twelve-year-old.]

I-- I don't usually look like this, by the way. I haven't been a kid in decades, I just...y'know. I thought it'd be weirder if an old man was beatin' up a bunch of kids. So I went easy on 'em.

[It wasn't even really a handicap, since he let himself split into six Stans and use flames. But an adult jumping in that way tends to be jarring, and when he interferes in a way that's too uncomfortable or shocking, a person's subconscious tends to shut him out and wake the person up. It wouldn't have been a comfort - they might have wondered if he would turn on them.]

[Got it "good" is one way to put it, even if they've not really had a chance to sit back and think for...for some time, have they? Not exactly a low-stress job. But it keeps them well-off, it keeps them living with people who care for them (who care for them, who must, because they love them, because they said that they loved them and so they have to, right?), and it means they can afford to take care of other people. To drop some money on a nice hotel for someone who had nowhere to go.

They don't contest that point, simply smile and shrug, because that's the kind of equivocal gesture they know how to do.

Stan's admission has them laughing a little at the peculiar mental picture, even if it probably seems - well, regardless, it was nice to see a kid coming to their aid.]

I'm a mutant who works with mutants! You get used to seeing all sorts of stuff. [Even if they kind of do find themselves appreciating the lengths he went to in order to assure their comfort.]

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You know, there ain't no rest for the wicked. Money don't grow on trees! | OPEN

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