abraxaslogs | 𝕊𝕥𝕒𝕝𝕜𝕖𝕕 𝕚𝕟 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕗𝕠𝕣𝕖𝕤𝕥, 𝕥𝕠𝕠 𝕔𝕝𝕠𝕤𝕖 𝕥𝕠 𝕙𝕚𝕕𝕖

Jo nods. It makes sense, especially since she's unsure how it works with her domain and Dean's. The actual arithmetic and rules. If it's half and half, or some full-on filtered mix of the two, and what does, how does that relate back to it being their thoughts, subconscious, etc., in the real world. The way it's gotten even bigger since Dean gave her this room. Attached this place.

He didn't seem to have even given a thought to doing anything else.

"Do you think you could—" Jo is searching for a word. No. Jo knows the words. It's just easier to use about bleeding bodies and burning houses, and yeah, she gets precisely how fucked it is that she'd rather be asking for help with that than something as stupid as a party costume. "-uh, help, then?"

There's a gesture absent toward her chest and her torso, but she means the costume.
As four or five in her parent's closet, she'd never played dress up since,
and this felt like a bonkers new version. But she's asking.

"I can, but there's a reason I just have Julie pick my costume. My ideas are pretty boring. I wasn't kidding when I said I usually just wear a hat or a headband with ears and call it good."

Nadine's just not sure she's the best person for this. If Jo were a little kid, it would be a different story. She can think of dozens of cute costumes for small children. A fully grown woman? She doesn't even put in effort for herself when it comes to Halloween.

"Maybe we should have a drink or...something. Loosen up the creative juices. Otherwise I'm probably just going to cycle you through a bunch of singers from the 80s." A pause. "You would make a pretty kick-ass Joan Jett, though."

Jo turns for the door, meaning to go find a bottle and a set of cups in the kitchen or the dinning room, before it catches up with her a second later. Her mouth presses, and she looks instead at her dresser. It's not habit here, but like Nadine's chair, she stares at the top of the dresser and thinks up the bottle and label of one of her favorite whiskeys.

It appears alongside two short glasses,
and she makes an uncertain noise at the back of her throat.

"I don't know how long it might take to get used to that."
It feels weird. It feels like cheating. Like everything Jo fights against.

But it's not hurting anyone. It's not harmful on any level. It's a weird little perk of this weird shared mental space. Jo pours the two glasses, only a finger for each, and then holds one out to Nadine. "I should have asked. Maybe you want to change it to something else? I know how to make softer drinks, most anything, but I usually stick to the basics when it's just me on my own."

"You'd be surprised how quick you start to get used to things. And it's fine." Nadine takes the drink, she isn't that picky. But after downing it she does call up her own, a rum and coke she can sip as they go.

"I find myself thinking about once a week, how weird my normal is now." Especially where her normal had always been pretty weird. The day to day, though, had been unimpressively mundane.

"I was never exactly what you'd call an ordinary girl, but...I spent most of my adult life in a little town on the coast of New Hampshire, Barnstead. I had a little house with a decent car and a normal job and I'd watch shitty reality TV at night while working on lesson plans and eating whatever Stouffer's crap I'd pulled out of the freezer...and that was normal. Now magic and Jules Verne medical school and fighting desert monsters and shapeshifting...that's my normal. But I'm used to it."

Jo takes a sip of her drink, not downing it fast, but there's a quirk at the edges of her mouth for watching Nadine down it in one go. She takes her small sip, holding it in her mouth briefly, enjoying the sharpness, while Nadine starts talking and Jo nods, leaning on the dresser behind her. It's a little odd trying to reconcile those first two statements. Not being normal; then describing the most normal, maybe even boring, Jo can think of.

The last mention there brings Jo to a halt.

"You're a shapeshifter?"

"Well, I wouldn't put it like that. 'A shapeshifter' implies I can change whatever, whenever. It's not like that. I can just turn into a wolf. Sometimes we just develop an ability like that. It's the same with these." Nadine gestures to the little pearly points of horns sticking out through her hair.

"They're not decorative, they happened after I first visited the Horizon. I can also touch someone and diagnose whatever's medically wrong with them. I call them gifts from the Singularity."

Jo's eyebrows raise on that last one.

The's a short whistle. "Out there or in here?"

That's got to be an incredibly handy skill as a healer.

He's starting to realize there are a lot of shades to this whole thing. Most of which aren't entirely apparent from the outside. The fighting. The politics. The magic. The Summoned. The Horizon. Everything, everywhere. She even has her own now, and that's so weird to think about after the long road of very specific facts leading up to this point in her life.

"Out there. That's how I was able to know what was going on so quickly, when we were on search and rescue. I didn't have to see to know what was wrong. It's like any other magic, it tires me out to use it a lot and if I'm worn out it doesn't work well, but it's really useful."

The most useful of the things she's developed in this world, Nadine thinks. Turning into a wolf is fun, especially now that she's been properly exploring the ability, but it's not useful daily. Diagnosing people is.

"Alright...a costume for you. Okay, I think the important question I need to ask here is do you want to do sexy or normal? Julie always veers to sexy, I'd put good money down that I'll be going as a slutty nurse this year."

Jo'd thought that they'd just been that good on their feet between the two of them, Nadine and Jayce. It's both impressive and a little wary making. Not about Nadine or her powers, but about herself and not having picked up on anything like that. The idea that powers could be showing up in the world, invisible all the time. Hiding in wait. Until released. No way to prep for them.

Dean's wings and weird little zippo lighter trick.
Even hers. It couldn't be seen until it was happening.

But Nadine shifts them back before Jo can think too hard about that and does so with a question Jo hadn't expected to come straight out of the blue. It makes Jo clear her throat, with a snort at the directness. The only defense against flummox of surprise that zigzags through her stomach. "It couldn't hurt to try some of them, I guess."

Except it's not really I guess, is it?

Except she's avoiding looking back at Nadine for a moment.
(Oh, god. How stupidly fucking stupid might this be?)

"Something more than—" Jo looks down at the cowgirl outfit still on her, leaning on the dresser. There's nothing wrong with the jacket, skirt, and boots other than she doesn't feel like this is here at all, but it's not just that. "...this."

"Okay, there's always the classic go-to for a basic sexy costume."

Nadine concentrates a moment, focusing on Jo. She's not as used to this. But after a moment Jo's clothes shift and rearrange themselves into a cheerleader uniform. Bright blue and yellow with a generic H on the front, and matching blue and yellow little sneakers.

Not a bad job, she thinks.

"The cheerleader. Cute, easy to move around in, easily recognizable as a costume but firmly rooted in the normal. And really easy to accessorize."

Jo looks down at it, and her hands come up as though not even sure about the idea of touching her own body suddenly in this. Her face probably says it all. This is every bit of the worst dreams she's sure her mother would have cried tears of gold at the idea, average apple pie, anything but a hunter's daughter. Jo's wondering, for the first time, if you light something on fire in the Horizon, does it burn up?

"No." She's shaking her head at it. "Not this one."

Beat. Jo tries to make it some more words.
"Maybe not something from high school times?"

"Okay, there's always the other most popular, simple costume option." It's funny, Nadine had never imagined it could be so hard to pick a costume. But she doesn't care what she wears, for the most part. She has no investment in Halloween as a holiday, really. The costume part is just what you do for Halloween parties, it doesn't mean anything to her.

The cheerleader outfit begins shifting, turning into tight black pants, black fuzzy boots, a black sleeveless shirt, black long gloves and a pair of furry black cat ears.

"The sexy cat, always a classic."

Interestingly, it's weird to watch her clothes changing on her body but not feel anything other than disconcerted by the strangeness of visually seeing it happen. There's no part of her worried about what Nadine might do to her (even as somewhere in the back of her mind, she's ticking away the knowledge that this is possible outward toward someone).

Jo turned around, looking at herself in the mirror. Considering.

"Not bad, but—" She let it linger. "Not exciting?"

"Not no?" But she wanted something,
something she couldn't name,
something more.

"Maybe we keep it in mind case there's nothing else?"

"Okay, we'll put it as a 'maybe'. Uh...if you want to go a little more glittery and girly, the cupcake thing was big for a while."

By which Nadine means a sparkly layered tulle skirt and sequined top with a cupcake hat and tights. It's certainly not something she'd imagine Jo ever wearing, and that's sort of the point of a costume. And it is cute.

But she only has so many ideas, and is pretty much just thinking about things she's seen on TV and in movies. Otherwise her main context for reference is elementary school children.

Jo looks at Nadine through the mirror, eyebrows and mouth both tilting,
a little wicked and the only warning for the words that come next.

"Right. And do I spend my night batting my eyelashes and telling people to 'eat me,' too?"

"If you want to." Nadine shrugs, not bothered by the look Jo's giving her. She warned her that when it came to creative costume ideas, she's probably not the best.

"I told you I wasn't great at this. I don't even pick my own costume. Maybe if you could give me some boxes to check...anything that would be a 'yes' instead of just all the 'nos'?"

Some parameters would help here.

𝕊𝕥𝕒𝕝𝕜𝕖𝕕 𝕚𝕟 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕗𝕠𝕣𝕖𝕤𝕥, 𝕥𝕠𝕠 𝕔𝕝𝕠𝕤𝕖 𝕥𝕠 𝕙𝕚𝕕𝕖

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