After spending thirty years of my life hiding my association with the Enclave [open]

[taediosum]

Who: Arcade (taediosum) & OPEN
What: Arts & crafts (or some long overdue vehicle maintenance)
When: Some activity during the morning stop & early evening 
Where: His truck
Warnings: TBD but nothing likely

Note: I have an opt-in here for Arcade's vital sense ability, please leave a comment if it's something you're interested in coming up here or in future threads! Otherwise, no worries, it just won't work on/around them.



[ Ordinarily, Arcade only looks for salvage of practical things, at the intermittent garage stop. He doesn't know much about vehicle maintenance beyond the basics, and even that's mostly still only in theory. (Luckily, he somehow hasn't had to field a flat tire or an overheating engine, yet.) But he knows plenty about surviving in a post-apocalyptic waste with little to live on, from place to place. He also knows too much about personally handling triage, in those same circumstances. 

So it's really no wonder it's taken him this long to start picking up things that aren't necessarily needed but still... Well, probably should have been considered, at least, a little sooner. (But he's had a whole host of other things to worry about, these past few months, unsurprisingly.)

He's already started a small collection of patchwork canvas, wherever he can find it. It's going to take a while to actually completely enclose the back of the truck, again, so that it can serve as somewhat more suitable shelter - so he'll be around crudely stitching together the various pieces of cover that he's managed to collect, thus far, both in the early morning hours and at night. He's not quite as good at sewing as he is at suturing, and it's kind of obvious.

Or maybe he's trying to flag someone down to lend a hand with actually fitting his makeshift tarp over the top of the truck's trailer— ] Hey, do you have a minute? I could use some help, here.

[ One particular evening, he can also be found with a small collection of old paint cans, painstakingly hunted down in the latest set of ruins. He's set up alongside the truck's cab, eyeing the faded spray paint stenciled logo on the door in front of him - before unceremoniously dashing a swath of old beige paint over it.

Maybe it's because he hasn't made a plan until now to actually get rid of it (despite all the trouble it's already caused), but covering it up feels better than expected. ]

Comments

[taediosum]

[ It's friendly, but it still manages to startle Arcade, who turns his head jerkily, almost guiltily toward the interruption before finding (some of) his composure again. ]

I've had a few more pressing priorities, of late. 

[ Like, you know, mutating into a horrific freak and also just generally struggling to survive while hoping to help keep as many others alive as possible— 

But that's not really a clarification he needs to make. Or feels the need to, his defensive knee-jerk reflex a fast-fading one. Hard to be too standoffish, when at least they're on the same page. ]

But I thought I'd get rid of it before someone else decides to make it their whole first impression of me.

[ Not that that seems especially likely. Danse recognizing it in the first place had been one nasty stroke of bad luck too far, already. Arcade takes another couple of swipes at the cab door with the brush he found, blotting out the rest of the insignia. The brush's stiff and clotted bristles aren't ideal for the job, but luckily it's not needed for any delicate work. ]

[androidvictoriam]

[ It doesn't sound quite so unlikely to Danse, who would expect anyone who's spent time in the Capital Wasteland to have a good chance of recognizing it. Then again, he's the only one who's made a thing of it thus far, so Arcade is probably right. And Danse has made enough of a thing of it for like three people, in any case, so he doesn't push back, only exhales mirthlessly in a way that suggests he knows the pointedness is deserved. ]

I'll vouch for you. If anyone else from my side of the country gives you a hard time.

[ But with the logo now illegible, that would be unlikely. He sticks his hands in his pockets to survey the current progress. His coveralls are a bit worse for the wear after all of that simultaneous horrific mutating, but this at least means that a few paint stains are even less likely to matter than they would have before. And he ought to be willing to get them dirty, to extend some goodwill here, so Arcade doesn't have to do all of this himself now that the satisfying part of it is over. ]

You have a spare brush?

[taediosum]

You don't have to do that.

[ Ideally because there won't be any reason to, after this. But Arcade isn't asking anybody to fall on their sword for him. He wouldn't have done, back home, and he won't, here, either. The cards'll fall where they may, and he'll try to deal with the next probably inevitable disaster a little better - but it's his burden. His past. His life.

Reaching for a little more of the paint from the can balanced on the truck's step (a second coat certainly can't hurt), he looks surprised as he glances back up at Danse. ]

Uh, check the crate. [ There's a small wooden crate he also brought from the garage, the other nearly-depleted cans of paint he collected still sitting inside, and he gestures to it as he straightens back up. ] I think I grabbed another one, but it might've fallen out.

[ More brushes weren't a priority; he would've painted with his hands, if it meant getting rid of that. But he's pretty sure he found at least two that had more than a few bristles left on them. ]

[androidvictoriam]

I know. I'd just rather see the truth being represented than a misconception.

[ There's a note of finality in Arcade's tone that tells Danse it isn't worth arguing over a hypothetical that probably won't ever come to pass anyway, so he leaves it at that. It's partly the principle of the thing, partly the fact that he truly doesn't want to see Arcade forced to contend with that again now that he knows the real story, but he thinks he's at least done his best to warn Deacon in a more roundabout way against judging anyone in the convoy too harshly from the start, and that probably will be the end of it.

He crouches to pick through the contents of the crate and see what they're working with. He can manage well enough with the brush that's fallen over and gotten tucked in along the side, if he wiggles the bristles around a bit to loosen them up. ]

Just the cover-up, I take it? Not sure what you'd want to replace it with.

[taediosum]

I don't suppose you would be. But I am.

[ Sure of exactly what he wants to cover up that ugly spray paint stencil-job with, that is.

His coat is hanging from the cab's side mirror, the hem more tattered than ever after that last fight - but the rest of it kept as diligently intact as possible. Arcade reaches up, tugging on the sleeve to pull the patch on one shoulder into view. The Followers' cross and the rod of Asclepius won't require a great deal of artistic skill to sketch onto the truck's doors, even with such shoddy tools. ]

If I'm going to be advertising my associations, I'd at least like them to be the right ones.

[androidvictoriam]

Well, it's definitely more appropriate for general audiences than the last thing I saw someone paint on the side of a truck here. You might have to turn away some people expecting sermons, if they don't already know you.

[ His tone is wry as he studies the patch in more detail. He's noted the insignia before with some curiosity, thinking of the red crosses he's seen in ruined hospitals and rusting ambulances, and wondering too how deep the religious connotations actually go, but he hasn't been in a position to ask since that first day they'd met.

All he knows about the Followers is what Arcade had mentioned about training medics and "spreading knowledge," whatever that means in practice, and the former is at least a good thing to advertise in Danse's opinion. And maybe the latter isn't so bad either, in a place like this. ]

But we can make that work. There ought to be enough paint if we do this strategically.

[ He sizes up the door and mentally overlays a grid on it, arms folded, before getting back to work on the second coat of beige. ]

[taediosum]

Historically, a red cross has a more medical connotation than religious.

[ And though the only paint he could find is a color likely to dry to a hue a little more on the purple-maroon side of that spectrum, it should still pass. Either way— ]

I won't leave anyone who does make that mistake in suspense for long, though, as to my actual feelings on old world-style religious fanaticism.

[ His brief, tight-lipped smile clearly indicates that they're not positive. Though the sermon will be no less passionate for it.

Picking up another of the nearly-empty cans of beige (a completely different shade, of course), Arcade rounds the truck's cab to the other side, to get to work on blotting out the matching stencil, too. It goes quicker, this time, because he's past the initial catharsis of it all. Now it just feels right, lifting a weight off his shoulders that he suddenly feels he's been carrying around for no real reason at all, all this time.

In the mellow, mild air of their last days in the valley, his voice carries easily. ]

You talk like you've done this sort of thing before. But you don't exactly strike me as the artistic type. No offense.

[androidvictoriam]

I know what those look like. When it's shaped like this, it just reminds me of trying to stay awake in church no matter what color it is.

[ Danse is not a guy who gets to talk about fanaticism of any stripe, religious or otherwise--even before taking on the Brotherhood's particular flavor of it, he was as post-apocalyptically Catholic as any other good Rivet City boy. But that was...more than one lifetime ago, by now. The only thing that comes through in his voice here is a low tentative hint of teasing, and some satisfaction besides to have accurately pegged Arcade's opinion on the matter.

He works steadily to even out the coating on the door, nitpicky and military-precise about it, and raises an eyebrow when Arcade speaks up again from the other side of the truck. ]

You make a lot of "no offense" assumptions, you know that?

[ Not that any of them have been that far off the mark yet. ]

I didn't say I was Picasso. I said I could replicate a symmetrical design. You know how many times I've had to repaint the insignia on my power armor?

[taediosum]

The east coast really is a different world.

[ Just the idea of going to church feels archaic, to Arcade, who's reasonably sure he doesn't know a single person with a belief system that's anything more than personal. At least if it isn't a cult or a military outfit they owe their devotion to.

He wonders, briefly, if that isn't a sticking point, here, but doesn't ask. Or make another assumption.

His brief, crooked half-smile is out of view on the other side of the cab, but probably still audible in his tone. Danse isn't calling him wrong, after all. ]

How would I even begin to guess? Not all of us spend our lives maintaining cumbersome suits of armor.

[ Some of us just keep them locked up safely in very secure bunkers, and spend most of our lives pretending they don't exist. ]

Or their paint jobs.

[ Still. ]

Glad to have an experienced hand, either way, though.