And To Concur [Cobalt!]

[Eve Delacroix]

You know, you'd expect the coffee to have a bit of a zing in it when it wasn't prepared by someone whose coffee machine was a thinly-disguised denizen of hell, brought to earth in a cardboard box to turn all its users into zombified desperados for the King of All That Was Sulphur And Brimstone. Sadly, this was not the case - and that was bound to make Cobalt extra cuddly and lovable today.

Brilliant.

She could use a good argument.

With a decidedly wicked grin not entirely unrelated to the King of All That Was Sulphur and Brimstone, Eve swallowed back the rest of her coffee - which had the same amount of taste as pureed eggshells and, if she was being honest, a bit of a bite to it that signified someone had an overly-friendly hand when it came to cloves - and crossed her legs beneath the table. The wind picked up the ends of her hair, sending it skittering over the back of her neck; the braid she'd had it in all morning was starting to come undone. It hadn't been very solid from the start, considering she'd braided it one handed while listening out for the postman, but, still.

At least she'd done it on her own. Stuck it to the doctors who told her, in Doctor Speak, that she'd be useless with only one arm, and amputation wasn't a likely answer to her problems since there was a grass-slim chance that she could get the use of her arm back. Not fully, by any means, but back in some little way that would, hopefully, mean she got to use both hands while braiding her hair. And could drive again. Currently, her shoulder felt as though it was stuck to her with Pritt stick and twine; maybe that'd go away, too, when she got control of herself.

Evie glanced up as a businessman sauntered past her, flashing a small, friendly 'just keep going' smile. Then, she ducked her head, tapping her unpainted, short-cut nails on the tabletop while she waited - mentally plotting her defences, even from now, since there was no such thing as Too Prepared when it came to Cobalt Weaver.

Honestly, she liked the man. Vexing him took precedence over liking him, but she did like him. Vaguely. From a distance. Possibly while armed with something cute and fluffy, just in case he got hungry and needed something to devour.

[Cobalt Weaver]

Cobalt was in A Mood. Firstly, he’d come to the intense realization with the unexpected arrival of Danny that his friends (but hopefully not himself) were a pack of teenage girls. After Danny’s little…revelation about his first time amongst Pilot Ridge’s bars, Cobalt wasn’t surprised that Josh was acting a little petulant. While Cobalt was aware of the color of the kettle, the fact remained that Josh didn’t handle things very well. Ben was the mystery here. For some reason, the younger man had decided to be petulant, snarky (and not in the fun way) and a little rude. Which was not characteristic of the man that Cobalt had come to know. In short… his friends acted like they were back in high school. Even more disconcerting was the fact that this revelation didn’t cause him to completely lose interest in being their friend. The odd fact remained that Cobalt still wanted to be friends with them despite the fact that he was well aware that they…just might not be the most mature.

Which was probably not fair to say. After all, they didn’t set up fairly regular meetings with a young trainer from Hammel because they wanted to argue—a real and honest argument—with someone other than their business partner. But he could really use a good, uncomplicated argument at the moment. And in truth, he rather liked Eve. She was a little cheeky, and sometimes cheated in her arguments, but she could hold her own in a verbal match, and she believed what she was saying.

So when he walked in to the coffee shop and grabbed his coffee, he found her easily. He nodded and walked over, settling down in the table next to her, sipping the hot drink. He made a face. “This coffee tastes like feet,” He said by way of greeting, “Why do we always come here? Shitty coffee isn’t going to better your chances of winning any.” Cobalt gave Eve a little smirk. “Okay, smarty pants, the same rules apply. No shouting, no ad hominem, and don’t take it personally when I prove you wrong.” Naturally, the majority of these rules were broken by the time they left, but who was keeping track?

“Also,” He said, his grin widening, “I think we get to talk about Hammel again this time. Since last time we argued about…something else, I dunno.” Cobalt liked to conveniently forget the arguments they had that didn’t go well for him.

[Eve Delacroix]

There was a phenomenon around Hammel known as the Cobalt Spectrum; it was usually characterized by alpha males sticking out their necks like over-eager giraffes, children running away from the spot, animals acting like the End of Worlds was upon them, and a wide grin to be prompted from the select few for whom the Cobalt Spectrum had no side-effects, such as Evie. You couldn't not know that Cobalt Weaver had made an appearance.

That was, she decided, the entire reason she'd seen the elderly cashier cross herself. 'Lo and behold, the son of the devil walks the earth' and so on, and so forth. He did sort of look like the devil, if you tilted your head thirty degrees to the left, squinted, and added plastic horns and a tail. Then again, he also looked like the kind of teacher that Determined To Be Different teenage girls claimed to have a crush on. Whether that was true or not depended on the girl but Evie could agree that, from a distance, and possibly sedated up to the eyeballs, Cobalt was not an unattractive man.

He was also perpetually wrong most of the time and aggravating, but those were just semantics. Important ones. To her.

It had to say something when the absence of a hello wasn't noted to a woman whose mother had attempted to groom her into the next addition to the Royal family in terms of politeness. "Because it pisses you off, it throws you off your game, and the wait staff know not to take your screaming ab-dabs seriously," Evie said, with too much cheer to go with the mediocre coffee. With one of her cheeky smiles.

Actually, Evie protested that, she wasn't cheeky at all! She was just right.

"Pft, you didn't prove me wrong the last time, what makes you think this time will be any easier?" Unlike Cobalt - or perhaps only slightly different from Cobalt - she kept track of most of the conversations that they had, to steer away from subjects that she'd lost in. "Alright then. Go ahead. What's bothering you about Hammel this hour?"

[Cobalt Weaver]

If Cobalt were aware of Evie’s theories and opinions of him and his effects on the world, it would only serve to support his opinion that Evie was completely bonkers. Absolutely crazy. Because he did not look like the kind of teacher that angsty teen girls claimed to have a crush on. Because he didn’t look like a teacher. And there was no such thing as the Cobalt Spectrum, and Cobalt hadn’t even stepped foot in Hammel for about thirty years. And Evie’s wide, smug grins were typical of Smartass Girl Syndrome. Leila had it as well. It was an unfortunate condition that the vast majority of his female friends possessed. Side effects included undermining Cobalt’s authority, making fun of him, and generally not taking him seriously. So there.

He gave an incredulous eyebrow at the cashier and tried to think of the last time he was here. It then occurred to him that the last time he was here, Evie and his argument got rather…loud. Huh. He thought she was being rather dramatic. It wasn’t as though that was all his fault. Whatever.

“I do not have screaming ab-dabs.” Cobalt rolled his eyes, pushing the cup away from him. “I don’t even know what that means.”

Cobalt gave her a crooked grin, “Okay then. Let’s start with the mandatory attendance first, shall we? Because I need to have some manner of food before I get to the forced segregation issue.” He gestured at his cookie before leaning forward, “Opinion: Hammel’s mandatory attendance should be dropped on the grounds that it is actually just a terrible idea. Think about it: you have a kid, stuck in the middle of puberty—a notoriously awkward and uncomfortable time for any child—with something strange happening to their body and then you just whisk them away from their family, friends and support group. Thereby taking any feeling of agency in these kids’ lives. This is, of course, with the understanding that some children will need a place to stay if the parents are unwilling to care for their child themselves. Go.” He sat back, and took a bite from his cookie.

Yay, arguing.

[Eve Delacroix]

The screaming ab-dabs were yet another side-effect of the Cobalt Spectrum; usually when he got so frustrated and annoyed and bear-with-a-sore-head like that he started yelling. It usually meant that Acts of Interminable Stupidity had occured within the Cobalt Spectrum, and given him a logic headache.

On a purely non-helpful note, Evie would have loved to see Cobalt on Jeremy Kyle or, for the American population, the Jerry Springer Show. If he couldn't make that pudgy bastard yell 'give up! all hope is lost!' then nobody could. Some people you just needed out of your life, fast.

Not that that was a slight against Cobalt! Not at all, no. The people of the Jerry Springer Show were they themselves a punishment. Given the situation, Cobalt would've been the one better off; Evie still found it hard to believe that those people voluntarily married and sometimes, most terrifyingly, managed to concieve.

"You do have screaming ab-dabs," Eve noted absently, "usually before you're about to lose. I'm starting to think it's a chronic medical condition, Cobalt. You should really see a doctor about it, the kind that carries horse tranquilizers about with him."

But, since screaming ab-dabs or lackthereof was not the argument topic, Evie replenished her bright smile, and leaned back in her chair a little, pushing a strand of her hair out of her face so it wouldn't get in the way when she was articulating flaws and counter-arguments. Some of the time - and this was probably the funniest of them all - they agreed on a topic and yet argued about the implementation, the naming, basically everything else about it.

It was usually around those times that the waitstaff started glaring.

"Well, what else are they going to do with them?" Evie steepled her fingers together, "I can hardly expect you to remember what it was like being a teenager, but they do tend to bring the world crashing down if something happens to them. Like a break-up. Without someone there to explain and channel their powers, people would resort to building homes out of styrofoam, so that every time some young brat got dumped, they wouldn't hurt someone."

Resting her cheek against her hand, she added, "anyway, children get bullied if they have a birthmark on their face, could you imagine the witch-hunts that'd be brought up if they weren't taken to a place with people like them?"

[Cobalt Weaver]

“I most certainly do not.” Cobalt denied mildly, mostly bemused more than anything else, “I don’t make it a habit to scream. Shout, yes. Raise my voice, certainly. I don’t scream unless the situation really calls for it.” He huffed out a laugh, “Oh good. Horse tranquilizers, that’s exactly what I need.” He was by no means a low-key type of man, but he was surprised to realize that he might not be the most high strung of his group of friends. Maybe that was why they all gravitated towards each other. Wasn’t that an encouraging thought.

“Oh, don’t even.” Cobalt snorted, “I remember all too well what it was like being a teenager, I’m not that old.” He rolled his eyes, “That kind of stuff happens at Hammel as well. And what I’m saying is, that if a kid sets fire to his bed or gets into a fight, the teachers at Hammel don’t respond like metahumans, they respond like teachers. Here’s what I’m saying: if we were to take the money that the government gives Hammel to fund the recruiting and the majority of housing and spread it out. Downsize Hammel itself and start up smaller programs across the country. That way, if an incident occurs, there is a place close by. In addition, teachers at the regular public and private school systems can get training, just as they would if they had any special needs child in their classroom.” Cobalt shrugged, “It’d be expensive and difficult, but I think it would be in the best interest of the kids altogether.”

“Oh-ho, see, that is the attitude that’s the real problem here!” Cobalt didn’t actually mean anything personal by that. He was just getting into the argument, so all tact flew right out the window. “Look, you’re right. Kids get bullied for anything that makes them different: their height, the way they talk, the way they walk, how poor they are, skin color and yeah, meta genes. But here’s the thing.” He leaned forward, spreading out his arms, “People don’t separate kids away from other people for any of that other stuff. Do you know that one of the main arguments for the Separate but Equal campaign was for the kids’ own safety, both black and white? And the Japanese internment camps? For the safety of the Japanese Americans.” He paused, letting the insinuations take hold, “They call that segregation now. The only difference with Hammel is that the facilities are really nice, but that doesn’t make the situation any less of a violation of civil rights.” And Cobalt would know a lot about those…

[Eve Delacroix]

“That’s my Christmas present sorted,” Eve decided, thought that was just a joke – she already had her Christmas present for Cobalt, and it was a pair of the most ridiculously pink, flowery, tiny jeans she could find. Why, yes, she did love the old sod – why do you ask? Oh, because of the jeans?

Sometimes, with Eve, love was akin to picking on them. Pulling their pigtails, if you will.

She could be mature, too, but that was arguably more terrifying than a snarky Evie, and thus will not be brought up again for the safety of minds everywhere. Anyway, the argument was distracting her right about now, like a cat distracted by the one loose thread on a forty quid jumper.

“They respond like teachers who understand what the kid is going through – that’s what makes them useful. A non-meta teacher would put the fire out, and then proceed to freak the hell out,” Evie reached for her terrible coffee, sipping at it, her face admirably blank considering that she was committing tastebud genocide, “which will lead to the kid freaking out, and so on and so forth, unless it’s one huge cycle of misery and chaos and taxpayer dollars and slimy politicians. Speaking of yet another thing – slimy politicians.”

That was probably not a valid enough point, and Evie was prepared to elaborate that, but the coffee momentarily took her mind off it – setting it aside, Evie leaned over to rest against her table, and prepared to elaborate on her point about slimy politicians, which was quite simple. “Nobody has ever hurt anyone by being Asian, unless you count hentai anime,” she side-tracked, “however, if you have a kid that can set fire to things, that is going to piss other parents off, which is pathetic, I know, but schools have to be very careful about that kind of thing. First of all, it would damage the child’s self-esteem to listen to people actively wishing for them to disappear; second of all, parents, being the reactionary, crazy things that they are, would yank children from the schools and cause some kind of economic failure.”

Her point about slimy politicians was coming soon, but she’d leave that for later – more coffee was required, of this bitter, acidic kind. It fuelled her angry nerves.

[Cobalt Weaver]

“Oh joy.” Cobalt had no doubt in his mind that it was a joke. He didn’t think that Evie would get him anything at all for Christmas, joke gift or no. Clearly, he was underestimating the enjoyment she gained from tormenting him. And it wasn’t as though Cobalt didn’t understand the importance of picking on the people you love. Only his taunting was purely verbal and more sarcastic than completely insane. He just wasn’t as excitable as Eve, he supposed.

Cobalt listened to her rebuttal intently. “Oh, get off the slimy politicians bit for a second.” He rolled his eyes, “You’re always going off about slimy politicians. You’re like a broken record.” What color is the pot, Cobalt? “Anyways, that’s not necessarily true. Teachers can empathise without sympathizing. And give the teachers a little credit: they’ll need to be trained, but again, it’s like specialized training for any other special needs child. You’re slippery-sloping, is what you’re doing.” Cobalt pointed at her, a little triumphant. “Obviously we can’t just throw the kids to the public schools unprepared. You have to integrate slowly and train the teachers for all the eventualities. That, and if there is either a meta teacher, or someone who has even lived with a metahuman, that will take the stress off, but that’s a minor point.”

Cobalt didn’t know what hentai anime was, and he didn’t want to ask. It sounded horrible. “If a parent wants to protest having a meta child in their school, I suppose they could. With the basis of precedence, they’d have no case.” He shrugged, “Legally, there’s nothing that would back them up.” He picked up his coffee, changed his mind, and put it back down again. “And that’s not true. People blame murder and violence on racial minorities since the dawn of time and yes, it’s stupid, but there is nothing that can convince a woman from a small, secluded town that African Americans are the sole cause of every single crime in the United States.” He rolled his eyes, “Let me tell you, that case was so fun.” Just thinking about that woman gave him a headache. “Whether or not it’s true, that’s somebody’s world. That’s truth for them, and that’s going to happen regardless.”

“And yeah. The problem is that it is going to hurt the child, knowing that people actively want them to disappear, but I fail to see how their parents sending them away to a secluded corner of the state to only see them on holidays, if at all, is giving them any different message.” Cobalt shrugged, “I mean, blah blah blah, who cares, but I certainly felt that way as a child.” He raised an eyebrow, “And one smart comment about me beig too old to remember…”

“Also, I highly doubt parents yanking their children from public schools will cause an economic failure.” He grinned, “Just saying.”

[Eve Delacroix]

Oh, Cobalt. There were few things women enjoyed more - or, rather, there were few things that Evie enjoyed more - than tormenting the men they knew. It was a trait that Evie suspected she'd picked up from her grandmother, who had more stories about the war (which was always a guessing game, until she mentioned one of three people: Churchill, Kennedy or King George) and about the pranks she'd played on soldiers than Evie thought possible.

She didn't think it was actually possible for a thirteen year old girl to talk Nazis over Beachy Head, but then her grandmother had always been a few screws loose, with a vivid imagination and just short-sighted enough to miss where the Line of Reality fell.

In short: Evie liked to torment Cobalt. It was a family thing.

And the slimy politicians deserved a mention. She'd met more than her fair share (alright, so it had been years ago, and yet it still left a bad taste in her mouth) and they never failed to get on her wick. The slime they oozed was a legendary source. If cars could run on slime, they could've switched from oil quite a while ago.

"Alright, you can train teachers, sure, but training isn't the same as watching it happen - it's still going to cause mass panic, at least the first few times. Training doesn't prepare you for the real thing; until they get used to it, if they ever do, there's going to be problems. Anyway, there's always the other kids to worry about; come on, it hasn't been that long since you were young. Sure, they sacrificed a heart to the sun every morning, and yeah, probably had to rub two sticks together for fire, but little kids are terrible. They pick on other kids for the smallest things - let alone if the other kid can throw stuff with his mind or control water, or whatever they can do."

Evie's short, blunt nails drummed a rhythm into the tabletop - Cobalt raised a good point (shush, she wasn't going to admit it) about minorities and blaming. She was ginger. Her boyfriend was Asian. Between them, they stocked up enough weird looks and comments to trade with. "It's better then having them around people who want them to disappear, isn't it?"

And she hadn't been about to make a 'Lol, Cobalt is old' comment. She had been about to say 'your highschool year book was carved into the walls at the pyramids of Giza' but now she wasn't going to; that was too easy.

[/blockquote]

OOC: I am sososososososo sorry for the late post I lost all muse for her for the longest while.

[Cobalt Weaver]

Honestly, Cobalt was sort of used to petite, loud women poking fun at him. It was basically a typical day at work, and he didn’t possess too much pride that prevented him from taking it with relatively good humor. Somewhere along the line, life got so ridiculous that Cobalt stopped taking it so seriously. Which was probably the best decision for his health. For the life of him, he still couldn’t decide whether or not moving back to Pilot Ridge had been a good thing or a bad thing, but it was at the very least interesting.

That, and he really liked debating, so he would put up with a lot of abuse for a good bout of verbal sparring.

“There will not be mass panic, you sensationalist.” Cobalt rolled his eyes, “There will be mass unrest, and probably a fair amount of civil disobedience and protest around the subject, but let’s not make it like the entire universe will cave in on itself if we tried to segregate metas and nonmetas. And you could make that training argument for anything. Remember, we’re teaching children, not going to war.” Cobalt held up a hand, “Not to trivialize the issue, but I genuinely do think you’re not putting enough faith in people,” The irony that Cobalt was saying this did not escape him, and he was very glad Leila was not here for this, “And they will get used to it.” He snorted at her joke, “Don’t be absurd, I’m not even going to dignify that with a response. But really, that’s my point: there will always, always be children who pick on other children. And anyone who’s different will be teased. It’s an unfortunate fact of life. But don’t think that Hammel doesn’t have zero bullying either. Because that is pretty not true.” He raised an eyebrow, “Keeping kids in a segregated environment doesn’t shield them from bullying.”

“No, it’s not.” Cobalt disagreed, “It’s allowing those bigoted people to get their way. And I’ve spent the better part of my adult life trying to fight that.”

He took a sip of the coffee without thinking and grimaced, “Ugh. Remind me not to drink that anymore.”