Beacon [OPEN]

The choir sings, the church bells ring
So, won't you give this man his wings?

It would a little of an understatement to say that Jaz was surprised by G's sudden outburst. To be honest she had clenched her fist the moment he raised his tone against her and her retaliating would have been relatively justified. But, honestly? When Jasmine heard the thesis of his little spiel, any ounce of anger she had within herself had dissipated almost immediately. She pulled on her face mask to cover her mouth and nose, turning to continue her work as she listened to his speech about how much the world sucked. It was ironic, really. Normally you'd expect their positions to be reversed. In a normal situation Jasmine would be the one bitching and G would be the composed one. But this particular situation was anything but normal.

Memories flooded the blonde as he spoke, reminding her of all the bullshit she went through in the relatively short time she's spent in this world. She had watched her parents died and been left to live on the streets by herself. She had made friends only to see every single one of them die in front of her. She had been attacked, beaten up to an inch of her life several times, had almost everything stolen from her. Then she was taken in by people with similar backgrounds to her. They taught her how to draw. How to enjoy life and how to fend for herself in a world that was out to stomp on everything that she was. And just as she began to think that she had found a place for herself, all of it was snuffed away from her in the blink of an eye, leaving Jasmine to once again fend for herself.

The only difference between herself and G was, Jasmine didn't let that define her.

"Maybe. Probably," Jasmine said, keeping her voice calm, decidedly not attacking him even though she had every right to do as such, "but then again how are you better than those that hate you? How are you any different if you act exactly how they expect you to?"

"You preach survival of the fittest. Kill or be killed. And while I don't think you're necessarily wrong, I don't think you're right, either. Yeah, I've lived through my fair share of bullshit. I have the track record, the scars, and the mental trauma to prove it. All of it more than a sixteen year old should ever have. And that's probably why I see so much truth in what you're saying and can relate to it so much," Jasmine explained, never once veering off from her drawing as she added highlight after highlight, giving life to her work as she now felt a little more inspired by this conversation.

"But I refuse to live my life like that. I can't. Accepting and becoming a part of the system that's made to bring us down would be me insulting the memory of every single person who died so that I could continue living, both for them and myself. I won't ever become the person who hatefully stared at a terrified six year old girl with a gun pointed at her face. Because that's what this world does to you the moment you accept all the bullshit that it throws at you and become complacent. Desensitized. You can say what you want about it being the only way to survive, but I'd rather die than become something I hate."

"It may be bullshit. It may just be nothing more than a fleeting hope. But I'm willing to bet my life on it. Call me naive or stupid or whatever the hell else you want, but I'd rather try to become the hope of change for others to seek rather than be drowned by depravity and despair and take the next generation with me. In this day and age, that's what a hero is to me." For the first time during her speech, Jasmine glanced at him through the corner of her eye, her posture displaying not a single shred of fear despite his warning of her being his prey. "Not some weak-willed moron who's nothing but a coward blaming the world for kicking too hard."

word count: 703 || tags: G Hajimari

The choir sings, the church bells ring
So, won't you give this man his wings?

An audible grunt was heart from Jaz before she growled, eyes turning crimson for a split second. This was exactly what she was talking about, which made her calm herself despite him throwing her to the ground as if she was some kind of ragdoll. The high horse that he took against her amused her at best, almost as though he could defeat her without putting much effort into it. But she bit down any snide remarks she had and sighed. Standing up, the girl stretched and rolled her neck, humming in delight when it popped.

She looked at him with the most apathetic and uninterested expression she was capable of, "Are you done yet?" She asked, folding her arms. "See this is exactly what I'm talking about. You assume I don't know what this despair you're talking about is. You assume I haven't seen jack shit. I'm not here for a dick measuring contest to see whose life was shittier, sir. That's just dumb. You hold on to the past like it's your only lifeline, but honestly it's the only thing bringing you down. You blame all the bad things that anyone's ever done to you on life and you just sit there and cry wolf about how bad things get. Did you ever try to change anything? What, you think 'survival of the fittest' is going to change anything? It's just going to cause more of the same shit that you've been through onto others. You're a fucking hypocrite. A hypocrite and a coward. Pretending to be the victim is easy. Especially when everyone has skeletons in their closets. But actually doing something about it in the grand scheme of things? That takes strength. So don't you spout this bullshit about 'school of life' to my face when clearly you're too busy stroking misery's cock to even realize that."

Jasmine raised a singular hand, steam and sparks coming off of her palm, "You've officially given me permission to fight back. So try me again, asshole."

word count: 337 || tags: G Hajimari

The choir sings, the church bells ring
So, won't you give this man his wings?

"Fucking please," Jasmine said, more to herself than anyone else really, as G suddenly walked away, mumbling something about how she was lucky and how she reminds him of someone or whatever the hell else it was. She didn't know. She was annoyed. Irritated. Pissed as fuck, even. Who the fuck did this dude think he was? First he showed up to watch her like some retarded guard dog under the guise of wElL yOu'Re A sHiTtY tEeNaGeR sO yOu'Re BoUnD tO fUcK sOmEtHiNg Up only to stare at her ass for gods only knew how long since he was a Vigilante and apparently that's what Vigilantes did. Then he started some edgy bullshit about him being the deadbeat bum of society who everybody hated. Then he attacked her - he's a vigilante, by the way - and just walks the fuck away saying she's lucky? Yeah, get the fuck out of here, you dumb shit.

Jasmine froze for a few seconds. Hands resting on her hips, she punched her inner cheek with her tongue and just stared at the dark sky. This really happened, didn't it? Like, all of it. It wasn't just some dumb mirage or whatever, was it? No, this actually fucking happened. Was this a Tokyo thing? She swore this had to be a Tokyo thing. Shit like this never happened in NYC. Then again she never met many mentally retarded vigilantes before, either. She couldn't help but groan as she tried to process this entire situation.

Eventually Jasmine went back to finish her work, all the while delving into an introspective review of everything that happened. No. That guy wasn't mentally retarded. He was stubborn, sure, but he wasn't at all some kind of loon who had escaped from a nearby psych ward. He was hopeless, misunderstood, and in a very dark place. In very similar a place that she once was, in fact. There had been times where Jasmine had found herself leaning towards the kill or be killed mentality. The thought process of if I don't stomp on everything in my way and utterly destroy them so they can't come back at me, they'll do the same to me. But luckily, she had found people who took her out of that hellhole. There were people who were willing to take a hopeless kid in, saving her from the curb to which life kicked her in.

And she couldn't offer the same to G. Instead, she simply let her frustration get to her, came off too strongly for him to handle, and ended up getting emotional and lashing out. All of which culminated into him giving into anger.

It was sad, really.

Jasmine sighed to herself again as she was close to finishing her piece which she aptly named 'Beacon'. Now after this whole charade, it had lost some of its meaning for her. Or rather, some of its importance. She felt less involved with it than she was before, almost as though the story wasn't about her anymore. And that was understandable. A prickle of guilt ebbed away at her the more she thought back on how she handled G; all she needed to do was offer him a hand and a shoulder to lean on, not tough love in the form of a verbal assault. A kick in the groin wasn't something a man who was already down deserved, no matter how much of a dickhead he was.

Fuck, she couldn't collect her thoughts properly, much less understand them herself. It was all a jumbled mess to her and it was annoying the crap out of her. Wiping some sweat off of her forehead, Jasmine huffed a tired breath. It was getting pretty late - or early, depending on the distinction you used. She was pretty much done with Beacon, and thus added her signature 'stamp' - a golden heart lit aflame. It was her way of signifying what was hers. Lots of walls back home had this heart on them. It acted as an indicator of the borders of her turf. Afterwards, she snapped a picture of the finished product with her phone. She figured this one might not last long, but at least she had saved it before it got defiled somehow.

Jasmine once again stopped for a second. She was still feeling pretty bad about what happened. Technically speaking it was kind of her fault, honestly. She checked the time - it was about four at night. She checked how much paint she had left; just enough. Fuck, she couldn't leave things as they were, could she?

It probably wouldn't help much, but Jasmine went to work. She dedicated the next two hours to the wall directly opposite to Beacon. She began drawing a silhouette - about two meters high and rather wide. The colors she used were mostly white, black, and yellow. She began from the feet, to the legs and then the chest and head, giving the drawing as much life as she could. She tried to remember every single detail about him - the sporty clothes, the gold chain, the weird ass glasses, the messy and the seemingly permanent scowl- wait, no. That would come across as an insult, wouldn't it? He'd probably think of this as her making fun of him. She sighed again; people were so difficult.

Instead of a scowl, Jasmine gave him a small smile. A small smile that accompanied his eyes which, as opposed to his actual ones, were brimming with life. He was watching Beacon with a hopeful expression. An expression she had hoped to see from him before she had told him off.

The sun had begun to rise as Jasmine stared at G's portrait. She added one last thing with what remained of her orange spray can before leaving to go back to Musutafu. Two words and two letters.

My bad, G.
-J

word count: 977 || tags: G Hajimari