call me maybe

[from_scratch]

Cam is out flying. There's a decent cloud of atmosphere around the gold plane, now, millenia of demons making air around themselves for comfort and not sealing it up because why would you bother. There's a small forest, here - the effect is kind of ruined by the lamps it has to grow under, but it's still pretty.

He feels an open summons and lets it grab him -

with the Joker (kappa)

with Ripper (kappa)

with Darren (Aestrix)

with Minus (kappa)

with Emma (Marri)

with Facility 3141592 (armokGoB)

with the admin (kappa)

with Jarvis (kappa, Aestrix)

with Miles (kappa)

with Hank (Nemo)

Comments

[manofmyword]

"It's a whole theme. It suits me. Clowns are scary, didn't you know?"

[from_scratch]

"I'm indestructible and demonic, you're not gonna keep me up at night for my own sake."

[manofmyword]

"I'm not trying to scare you. No comment on whether or not I could. Maybe if I got to know you better. No, but I mean - clowns are this thing that's supposed to be fun and lighthearted, but people find 'em creepy all over the place. The jokers are the wild cards, not really in the deck and not really out of it either. I wear an expensive suit, but it's purple and scruffy and the vest clashes with the jacket. There's a whole aesthetic to it, see?"

[from_scratch]

"Maybe it's lost on me."

[manofmyword]

"Mm, it's lost on a lot of people, honestly. I think Johnny's starting to get it, though."

[from_scratch]

"Maybe he'll explain it to me."

[manofmyword]

"I set a billion dollars on fire once," he says, which may or may not appear to be a bit of a non sequitur.

[from_scratch]

"Why did you have a billion dollars in paper form?"

[manofmyword]

"We-ell, that's a story. See, I stole some money from the mob, and through some crazy hijinks, that led 'em to hire me to find somebody else who took the rest of their money. Which I did, and then there I was with the thief - what he actually did was more complicated, but for simplicity's sake, call him a thief - on top of a great big pile of cash, and I lit the whole thing up in front of one'a the guys who hired me. Of course," he grins, "I was only burning my half. It's a joke, see? Make 'em think I'm in it for the money, and then burn that theory to the ground."

[from_scratch]

"By 'you were only burning your half' you mean 'there was obviously no sense in which that was physically what you were doing', right?"

[manofmyword]

"Mm? Nah, that part was straight. Their half was in a different pile."

[from_scratch]

"And the fire didn't spread?"

[manofmyword]

"A different pile in a different building," he clarifies. "The fire never got out of the warehouse. It wouldn't have been as funny if I'd burned their money too."

[from_scratch]

"Maybe I'm just having a little trouble with your sense of humor."

[manofmyword]

"You know, a lot of people have that problem."

He enters the underground parking garage of a decrepit-looking apartment building.

[from_scratch]

"Have you considered moving into a more accessible genre?"

[manofmyword]

"I did say I'm a retired terrorist."

[from_scratch]

"Congratulations. You want a slice of cake with two letters from 'we'll all miss you at the office' on it?"

[manofmyword]

...The Joker laughs so hard he has to temporarily stop the car.

"You're such a charmer," he says, half-giggling every word. "C'mon, we're almost at my place, if you wanna give me cake you can do it there." And he resumes progress toward the back of the garage's top level, where he parks.

[from_scratch]

Cam lets himself out of the car. He seems to know how cars work, despite being a demon from the future.

[manofmyword]

The Joker leads him to some stairs, and up the stairs to the roof of the garage, and across the roof to where someone's living room window has been slightly modified to swing open like a big glass door. In he climbs, whistling.

[from_scratch]

Cam follows him in. "This where your friend is due to meet you? At some point?"

[manofmyword]

"I told him he could come by while I was out. For all I know, he's already here."

[from_scratch]

"All right. I would like to get on finding the nuke relatively promptly, but I guess I don't know what I'm going to wrap it in yet."

[manofmyword]

"Part of the reason I wanna introduce you is so you can have somebody along who knows the city and the situation but isn't as eye-catching as I am," he says. "Even if I took the makeup off, these scars are pretty famous by now." He taps his cheek illustratively.