Black and White (Me and Juney)

Finding this guy may take a little more than merely wishing for him to turn up. Sometimes you need small miracles to occur. Sometimes those small miracles can lead to the greatest culminations of life. Sometimes they come from situations we would never see coming.

"Okay Gwharr. We'll take a walk. Get a little cool air for the brain and think about our next few steps." Bliss made her way back to the sidewalk of the street. Darkness provided a backdrop to the vast stores lining the blocks of this part of town. Not exactly prime real estate, but good enough for owners to not drop chain fences over their windows every night.

A small sliver of light permeated a bench ripe with graffiti. No respect at all for anything other than needless destruction and art for the sake of art became the clear motive for the City of Angels. Weeds poked through rugged cracks in the asphalt too derelict to offer any defense to what nature sought to reclaim, but no one cared about the wildlife of Los Angeles. Especially not the man in the wheelchair by the bench. Casting a deep shadow over his face, a worn and ridden Kevlar helmet drooped over the man's hard brow. Lines carved through the thick skin allowing him ample room to hide his thoughts.

His uninviting appeal caught the attention of Bliss and pulled her to him."Are you waiting for the bus?"

"What's it look like?" He kept a look forward while his eyes gazed over to the side. The stitching in the green sweatshirt began coming undone around the army emblem on his chest.

"Well, the bus doesn't come to this stop anymore." Bliss never visited major cities without committing to memory the major lines of transportation that ran through the city. Her passive memory recall gave her the perfect conversation starter with someone with no desire for conversation. "I guess it's too dangerous."

"Perfect." He began to motion his arms to take the reigns of the wheels to his side when his arms fell back to his side.

"Can..." Bliss wanted to leave the man behind. Something about him pulled her to him, but she wanted so badly to leave this guy behind. "I do anything to help?"

"I didn't ask for any help." Resolve came to his arms as he gripped the sides of his chair. Maybe Bliss wasn't the first person to consider leaving this guy behind.

"I can give you some help. I'm heading down towards a stop that the bus does come to." She would side track a little to get there, but expedience no longer rested in her actions.

A silence rested between the two. He didn't need the companionship. Someone to push him in his chair while wondering what his problem is didn't seem like a good enough trade off. He would push the remains of his life himself. "You can show me where the stop is."

"Alright." Bliss motioned to Gwharr to follow her. Without taking the direct meaning of his words Bliss moved to push the wheelchair.

"Don't touch the fucking chair!" His arms pushed his chair forward as he exclaimed in anger. "I didn't tell you to help." His demeanor returned but the severity in his eyes looked as sharp as ever.

Bliss swallowed her amazement and began to move towards him. At first she thought off moving behind him, but he might get the idea she would at any minute seek to proved unwanted help. Standing right beside him as they walked would be best.

"I'm a little jumpy. Heard some blast a few blocks over and, well..." In between the silence of his pauses rang the axle of his chair. "Not the best thing you want to hear in the night."

"Rough neighborhood doesn't really explain that does it?" Bliss continued on her way with her arms crossed over her chest. The top of the hood of her sweatshirt rubbed ever so gently against the few strands of hair from the back of her neck.

"I've seen rougher." A hint of inflection rested inside of his phrase. Not a complete joke, but also allowing Bliss a little insight into the man. "I didn't slip on a banana peel. If I had done that I wouldn't be taking a bus three hours from home to get a doctor."

"I hear tort reform in cartoons is getting ridiculous though." Against her instincts Bliss gave a small joke. He gave a small smile as he continued his trek. It must be lonely she thought. It's not that no one wants to talk to him; they just don't know how. You mix the service, the injury, and situation that gave him the injury and you don't know what you'll get in a social setting, so most people just do their part to hold the door open and move along. It wasn't much, but it was something. You always need something to get started.

When Bliss suggested they get some air, Gwharr was happy to oblige. After all, untill now he had been pumped so full of adrenalin that his bodyfluids could probably be sold as some sort of energydrink. It had grown dark since they had started their little adventure, but Gwharr had barely even managed to notice this fact with all that had been going on aruond him. It was a rather chilly night with suited the caveman perfectly. He felt as if he needed to cool of for a bit after the adventure they had been a part of today.

As the pair moved along the almost empty, decrepit streets Gwharr was rather surprised to find that they where all but entirely empty. In a way they almost looked abandoned. The entire neighborhood looked like it was in such a state of disrepair that it was on the verge of falling together. There where broken windows and crackedwalls. Plants were growing through the asphalt, as nature seemed to be reclaiming what was rightfully hers. He saw faces in some of the windows gazing out onto the streets, most of them looking back at him, and he could not really blame him. It was obvious to any and all who observed that he was not an average human. Especially not since he weighed in at half-a-ton and looked like some massive, hairy apeman and knucklewalked to move forward, just like a gorilla.

Gwharr decided it was best to keep in the background when they encountered the wheelchair-bound human. Gwharr had been around long enough to know that those with inreparable injuries tended to live longer than they did back in his day, due to the less dangerous surroundings and presumably some civilized, scientific mumbojumbo too. He supposed that was a good thing, but he couldn't help but to feel it was 'unnatural' somehow. Not necesarily bad, but still not as it's supposed to be.

Gwharr decided he would stay the background whilst Bliss spoke to the disabled man, gazing at him thoughtfully whilst running his fingers through his thick beard in an almost philosophical manner. Something about him made the Confused Caveman uncertain about what to say. Not to mention the fact that the man seemed to be somewhat easily irritated. However this made Gwharr happy rather than annoyed or angry. The man had pride, despite his condition. Gwharr would not be surprised if the the wheelchairbound man had lost the use of his legs in a war somewhere, mostly due to the helmet, but also because of the attitude. Some of the old men back at his old tribe had also gained a stubborn sort of pride as they entered the final stage of their life.
The half-a-ton heavy caveman moved forward, worried if his appearance might have any averse effect on the man. After all, there was no chance in hell for him to pass himself of as a human.

He gazed at the construct, looking the man up and down. He wondered what had driven a man such as this out at this hour. He was definately a target for the ones he liked to call the 'ambushers', but that most people reffered to as muggers. He knew that most of these muggers had no honor. No qualms about hurting those weaker than themselves. Gwharr would make sure that this wheelchairbound gentleman and his Cool Companion would make it through the neighborhood unnaccosted. He knucklewalked behind the pair, keeping close enough to tell eventual, hidden onlookers that these two were with him, and any and all who thought pushing the cripple and the tiny, frail woman around was a good idea had to go through him first.

"Warrior?" The Ponderous, Primitive Primordial asked the wheelchair-bound man shortly as they walked. In a way this question was not just idle curiosity. It was a test to see if the wheelchair-bound man was fit to temporarily join forces with his newly formed pack for however long their roads ran side by side.

"Veteran." He spoke in a mild manner as he continued to push himself down the street. "It's not the same thing. When you're a 'warrior' people will ask you things about yourself. When you're me, people just hope you don't make them feel bad." His hands moved off of his wheels with every stride of his chair. "They hold the door for you, but they just want you to get through the door faster. Maybe you'll even say thank you for it and they can go tell their friends they did a good deed for a guy down on his luck."

The night grew colder.

"The winds picking up." Cold didn't bother Bliss much anymore, but the wind could still give her a determining feel on the weather. "I don't normally feel cold, but it's starting to get come back to me." Under any other time she would keep any of this information to herself, but given the severity that hid in the silence Bliss would give up this tiny bit of information.

"I had a girl who was your size. She always complained that it was too cold. I bet she's still cold." All this talk ate away at the distance it took for them to get close to the bus stop that would take them away. Sometimes talking about how cold it was outside could deter from talking about how cold it was inside.

"The bus still comes by here. It usually drops by on a thirty minute schedule, so it should be here in about five or ten minutes." With crossed arms keeping her warm like hugging a frozen turkey would Bliss began to show serious signs of cold. "Jesus, it's like thirty degrees out here."

"It's a little cold, but it only feels like fifty-five at the coldest. Thanks for the directions, would've looked stupid sitting around waiting for a bus that never came." No one wanted to spend the twilight hours creeping towards one o'clock waiting for a bus. At least someone took time to wait for him.

Gwharr listened to what the man had to say, and despite being a thickheaded brute he wasn't all that surprised at what he had to say. After all, cripples had rarely fared well in history, and apparantly they still did not fare all that well, despite of the miracles of modern medecine and all that. Their physical shortcommings where somehow preventing them from connecting to other people socially as well as they would have been able if they had been able to walk. The caveman nodded and patted the man's shoulder sympathetically. He was unsure if that was the proper behaviour to do so, but he figured that the gesture would understood.

He ultimately decided that the man had passed his little test in answereing the way he did. He had been concise, somewhat friendly and most importantly:Respectfull and kind. Heck, the fact that he hadn't even once made any remarks about Gwharrs appearance was also promising, but he figured that bothe the cripple and the Primitive Primordial-American where both misfits in this modern world. None of them could truly be integrated in modern society due to their physical oddities and in Gwharrs case his mental shortcommings aswell.

"To think they's no do very good deed then." Gwharr said thoughtfully, as the trio of Mysterious Misfits moved forward comming ever closer to reach the final destination:The bus-stop. However, someone pulled the emergency-breaks onboard his mental train of thought as Bliss mentioned the fact that she was cold. He thought she didn't feel cold. Heck, everytime he felt her arms on his shoulders he was stricken how they felt cold and clammy, like the arms of a corpse, not at all like the arms of a normal person. This made sense when you considered her ice-related powers, but it was still quite an oddity.

Even though he was not really attuned to the thinling way of thinking, even Gwharr could feel that there was a metaphorical cloud of something akin to "sorrow" but not quite blocking out the metaphorical sun over the trio. He could not quite understand, but he understood that none of his two companions where all that happy at the moment, although they somehow managed to support one another due to their mutual "sorrow". This cloud hung over him too in some way, although, it was probably not for the same reason as it hung over the other two.

"To be glad to have met you, veteran. To think you'se wiser than most." The caveman said as they approached the bus-stand, hoping that his words somehow managed to warm the frozen heart of the veteran, although he sincerely doubted they would. He may be stupid, but he was far from naive.

A few minutes later the bus pulled away. Bliss helped the man onto the lift that brought him up to the bus. He rolled himself towards an empty section left open underneath a circular sticker of a handicap sign. After his chair moved into place in the railings a clicking of the mechanism moved into place anchoring the chair. "I guess we all look alike." He spoke as his eyes gazed over the sign. "To the unobserving I guess."

"Take care of yourself. And it's okay to let someone else in every once and a while. They probably are looking for more help than you are." Bliss made her way to the front of the bus to make her way back down to the bus stop. As she took her steps down, she caught the image of the man sitting and gazing out the window. Maybe something in the blackness of the night caught his attention. Maybe he could see past the city.

"Okay Cap, we need to find this Wombat guy." Bliss took her stead next to her large companion. "If you were a delusional superbeing where would you be?" As the bus moved into gear Bliss looked over to Gwharr. "Oh yeah, next to me." Bliss brought her gaze from her companion to where the bus had been. "Try to sniff him out Cap; I've got appointments to make and people to recruit."

The exhaust from the bus faded away and Bliss and Gwharr took back to their search for Wombat. She could only guess he needed to go to work the next day, or spend it with his kids or something. Hopefully something would give him away for their search to prove results.

Gwharr waved his hand as the wheelchair-bound veteran was allowed to go onto the bus, presumably heading back home, wherever that might have been. Gwharr had actually taken a liking to the old man. He seemed to be a clever guy. Wise in a way. But the thing that he had liked most was that he had been one of the few "modern" humans he had actually felt some sort of connection to. Gwharr moved slightly back, keeping out of the light, so that the passengers where less likely to Gawk at him. He hated when they did that. It seriously angried up his blood.

Bliss once more got back out, telling him that the pair of them needed to get back in touch with the other, less physically gifted Captain, and then proceeding to theorize where he might be hiding. Gwharr thoughtfully stroked his beard as he looked back at the bus, hoping to get one last gaze of the departing veteran before he dissapeared, but as it were, something else caught his gaze instead. A small, pudgy man, looking as any other average office-worker on his way home, except for one thing:He was wearing a mask. A mask with glasses worn outside it. It had to be Captain Wombat

Gwharr grinned slightly, and pointed at him "To know where he is!" The gargantuan caveman said, utilizing all of his special caveman-powers to repress a hearty laugh.
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Bliss did not have to wait long before she was able to once more lay eyes on captain wombat. In fact, he had been on the very busy that she had just let the old man onto, although he was now in his "secret" Identity. However, as soon as she left, he quickly ripped the cape and cowl of his "Captain Wombat" suit and put it down over his face. It was rather uncomfortable, since he had forgotten to take off his glasses before doing so, but that problem was quicky rectified. The very few passengers on the bus looked at the weird little chubby man put on a strange mask, and a collective eyebrow was raised as he jumped off the bus, running after what they asssumed to be the wheel-chair-guys daughter or something like that. Apart from his newly applied cape and cowl he was wearing a short-sleeved jacket, a pair of polyester slacks as well as an open overcoat against the nippy weather, as weall as a bright red tie. He quickly ran after the woman, his coat and cape fluttering behind him, like a pair of mishapen wings.

"Wait! Wait! Its me! Captain Wombat! I'm here and I'm ready to fight the villains, by Boggity! I tried to take my WombatMobile, but it had been clamped, and. . . hey wait!" the strangely dressed little man shouted loudly as he caught up to the woman. He once again cursed the witch who in her villainous trickery had kidnapped him so that his WombatMobile (a rather rusty ford dodge) had been clamped due to being parked illegaly for several hours. Apparantly that was a part of her villanous plan to make sure that the brave hero would foolishly fight her without access to his wombat-technology and. . .

. . .Aaaaw, who was he kidding?

The witch didn't care enough about him to get his car clamped. Heck, his presence would probably go unnoticed if the frosty woman actually allowed him to participate in the battle, but at least it would give him some superhero cred, something he sorely lacked. Not to mention it would associate him with Captain caveman and Bliss as a superhero crimefighting-team. He would be the heroic one, whilst Bliss was the pretty one and Captain-Caveman was the team pet!

Popping up as suddenly and unexpected as ever came the famed Captain Wombat. "I guess the by my side thing was more than a rude comment." While he stumbled to put on his best routine of importance to someone half his age and another who he could not begin to estimate his elder, Bliss continued to dig through her bag while waiting for the Wombat. "Okay I need something simple made up so that Captain Caveman here can communicate from far away distances. It can't use numbers, because he can't. And it probably shouldn't be too complicated because he is very simple. Also, if it doesn't work he is going to smash you." A straightforward deal from a very blunt woman.

Out of her bag came a small chip of sorts. "This will be what you are going to use to get in touch with me. The outer shelling of this device should probably be a toy phone. Something along the lines of press 'Big Bird' to talk to Bliss." She tossed the small chip over to Wombat. "Now, those chips go directly to a device I built, so don't lose it, and make sure that Cap doesn't swallow it." When this night began things in Bliss' world looked slightly hazy on what she would do. In a strange way, things now seemed more clear. She found a few new members for her team, even the Wombat may have a strange part to play in her plan. "After you build that you're going to need to watch out for Cap and make sure that he gets where I need him. Don't ask me where that is. I don't know where that is yet." Hiding her intentions and the danger of the situation from the duo she now saw as her teammates came easy to Bliss.

"In about a month, head to New York and make your way to Central Park. If I need you before then, I'll get in contact with you." Walking on the back of her heels Bliss began making her way away from the group. She turned to walk away and headed back into the coldness of the night. In a few short hours she would start up her search again, and maybe this time she could find some leads instead of another assortments of freaks and lunatics.

Gwharr felt slightly confused about this whole thing. For some reason it didn't quite sit well with him to use technology. Not to mention that he found that bit about the numbers slightly insulting. He was rather proficient with numbers for a caveman. He could count and all that jazz. However, Bliss was right in one thing. He was not able to use the wee little useless buttons on a cellphone, mainly because his fingers where on par with the arm of the average man when it came to thickness. There was simply no way his trashcanlid-sized hands would be able to work with such an annoyingly tiny device. He was well aware of the fact that he would probably crush it in a fit of frustration sooner or later.

One big button also simplified bits for him. He may be fairly adept with numbers, but when it came to remembering sequences Gwharr was not very proficient. Remembering sequences was a thankless chore for tiny wusses that didn't have the minerals to engage in fisticuffs. Mighty, Muscular, Manly Men like Gwharr did not bother with such sillyness. They usually had someone else take care of that for them in exchange for food or the privilege of not getting their scrawny bodies pummeled into a wet stain on the ground. Despite many claims to the opposite Gwharr did not have much innate cruelty, and very few sadistic urges. In fact he much preffered for people to get along, even if he liked a good scrap in a while. However the point of this little exposition was to demonstrate that he was not the type that liked to see things suffer. But, if the choice came between remembering a sequence himself and making someone suffer in order to coerce them into remembering the sequence for him, he would take the latter option ten times out of ten.

As Bliss turned and went into the night Gwharr felt a wave of sadness wash over him like a particurlarly nasty tidal-wave filled with half-rotten, dead clams and smelly water-vegetation. He resisted the urge to go follow her this time. She wanted to go her own path, and even though he thought that the pair had made quite a formidable team, he would not force her to endure his company if she did not want to. The poor caveman felt lost for one or two seconds before he remembered something about the other man. He was tiny, and Tiny people had to do what those that were bigger told them to do. "To be hungry! Wee Wombat-man give Captain Caveman food whilst build thing."

The smaller man looked up at Captain caveman, seemingly snapping out of some deep thoughts. "By Boggity! I have some serious work to do and all you think about is. . ." He started before he noticed that the larger captain was smiling, revealing a set of vary nasty-looking teeth. He wondered for a few brief minutes wether cavemen where cannibals or not, before he decided he didn't want ot find out. Besides, if he brought this beastie home, his wife wouldn't be able to say his superheroing didn't give any results. and if they kept him fed inthe kitchen whilst he worked in the wombat-cave (or garage) he wouldn't get in the way, or sit on his Wombat-Sailer. "You hungry? Well, my wife makes the best spaghetti bolognese this side of the missisippi, By boggity! Come on Captain!" he said, and the pair walked down the street, heading off into new adventures, involving self-discovery, a scuffed knee and ludricious amounts of Spaghetti bolognese.