Chapter Text
Being at work at the same time every day has been getting dull. He’d prefer to be cheerful with his coworkers, but it’s been getting harder as the weather’s been getting colder. Something about it this year has left him feeling foggy in the head. A little reprimand could get his cogs turning in the right direction.
So he doesn’t forego breakfast just because he woke up a little late, and he doesn’t take the alternative route to the office despite his knowledge that his usual route crosses that of the parade.
He's able to get off at the tram stop like usual, which means it's only a couple more blocks of walking until he’s at the office. Slight disappointment settles in Scar’s stomach; he was really hoping to cross paths with the parade on his way to work, but if it’s already passed, then so be it. He just hopes Bdubs is in a good mood, because Scar’s usually full reservoir of optimism and cheer is running a little dry today and he doesn’t have it in him to deal with a day full of his friend's griping.
When he turns the corner, however, he’s met with a crowd, tightly packed along the sidewalks of a cross road. Eagerly, he pushes forward as far as he can, elbowing past other onlookers. At first, he can’t see anything, but above the din of eager muttering, he can clearly hear low, booming drums and droning music getting louder. He stands on his tiptoes, pressing weight into his cane to try and see down the road.
The parade is coming up the road, getting closer and closer until Scar is finally taking in the details, seeing what the celebration has to offer. He’s never been this close to the Creation Day parade before, since nobody he knows is a Watcher. It’s always been a bit… intimidating.
Everyone knows the Watchers are a lot of things. Dramatic, mystifying, and most importantly, rich. The Church of the Watcher must be richer than their god, with how much pageantry they pay for. The problem is that they do it well, keeping their secrets under lock and key and hosting public ceremonies that have outsiders drooling.
The streets are full of dutifully-veiled congregants, some humming or singing along to a unified, resonant chant. Interspersed are purple-robed musicians carrying enormous drums and dark, twisting horns. Coming up the street is the central piece of the parade— an elevated stage upon which a circle of somber priests perform some sort of ceremony, surrounded by heaps and garlands of purple flowers.
As it approaches, Scar can make out more details. A group of figures stand in a circle around a dais, passing items between them to a central figure, who raises it up for a moment and then throws it into a fire at the center. They are the most dazzling of all the revelers, shimmering like royalty, adorned with halos and inky, iridescent wings. He’s seen them before, but never like this, or at least not so close.
The sight is enthralling. Instinctively, Scar takes in the way the glow of the fire casts light across faces and shadows behind their wings. His eyes never leave the stage, and his hands fumble for the sketchbook in his breast pocket, elbowing another onlooker in the process. His mind is putting thoughts and images together faster than he can pull a cohesive idea out of his head, leaving him scouring for the right detail, unsure of what he’s even looking for. Mesmerized, he wonders if there is something to this, some magic unknown to the fast-moving outside world that holds his gaze.
He wants grasp the magic in his hands, smear rich purple across a canvas until it makes sense, because it certainly doesn’t right now.
There’s something begging to be seen in the glossy silk of the priests’ robes, concealing the shapes of the bodies beneath. The fabric is a rare jewel to Scar’s eyes amidst his endless days of linen, cotton, and wool. Yes, it’s always handsome young men with elegant noses, jaw arrogantly standing above a tall white cotton collar. He knows how to do a suit justice, and he’s no stranger to beautiful men. They’re all he draws, the guiding lights that keep him going through the suits. Why is it the silk and the pageantry that draws him in so?
As the group passes through a gap of golden morning sun, one of the priests makes eye contact with Scar. It must be entirely accidental, as he hastily looks away, back to the fire on the altar, but Scar does not avert his gaze. The priest shines in the light, golden and glittering like a young god. A grand painting flashes behind his eyes, something so much bigger than advertisements and pretty men.
A sense of what he’s looking for begins to coalesce, under his ribs, where he cannot yet reach it.
The cart bearing the platform is already passing by, forcing Scar to crane his neck and make the most of what he can see before his newfound muse slips out of sight. A gold circlet shines amidst his light brown hair, supporting a shimmering halo above the crown of his head. Unlike some of the others, he only wears one pair of wings, but they arch beautifully upwards, reaching to the sky. With some dismay, Scar notes that the ceremonial robes obscure the man’s whole figure, but he supposes he can get creative.
As the stage moves slowly up the road, he sees the man’s face in snatches between the heads of other priests and the wall of wings and halos that protrude from their costumes, but he can’t glean much more than fragments. He waits, motionless, and watches the platform roll away.
Once the parade passes by, the crowds on the sidewalk begin to dissipate, leaving Scar leaning on his cane, eyes unfocused. Idly, he remembers that he was on his way to work and only half-thinking, he continues down the familiar sidewalk towards the office.
He takes the elevator up, up, and up, perplexed. On the seventeenth floor of the tall building, Scar exits the elevator. In this building are almost all of the country's Thomkins offices, the national headquarters. The CEO, the designers, financials, hiring, people who tick off little boxes on paperwork and answer phone calls, all working to make their business the biggest seller of men's shirts for the last five years. Scar plays an integral role in that ecosystem, as a dedicated advertisement artist. There are a couple others who he works with, but they don't have the notoriety that Scar does. No, to the people, the name Scar Goodtimes is synonymous with the tall-collared shirt. His drawings made their product and it has only grown the pressure that presses Scar to the ground most days.
Exiting the elevator, he hopes he can make it to his studio without anyone giving him grief, because he has thoughts that he needs to work out. The vision of the Watcher priest and the whole parade circles through his head, and he wants to sit down somewhere quiet and pick it apart. With all of his work supplies here anyway, he could probably churn out a few sketches from the concoction of memory and imagination, which might help him pin down what he wants to make. Sure, planning out a sudden passion project isn't what Mr. Impulse pays him to do, but he knows he doesn't have any modeling slots or meetings today, so it would probably be just another shift of him putting the finer details on his current piece.
He doesn't get so lucky.
"Scar!" A rough but friendly voice calls to him from behind him.
Scar turns around, plastering on his brightest, most jovial smile. "Bdubs! Good morning, sir, how are you on this beautiful day?"
Bdubs steps out of his own workroom, a pencil tucked behind his ear and no tie closing the collar of his shirt. Typical. "Well, I'm doing just fine, Scar." His smile is wide as ever. "You're late, however."
Scar shrugs. "What can I say? I got caught up in the streets."
His friend's eyes widen somehow, shimmering with interest. "You saw the parade? How was it?"
Scar turns and keeps walking down the hall, Bdubs following to join him. He waits before replying, unsure of how to put it in words. "It was mesmerizing. Like nothing I've ever felt before. It gave me a lot of inspiration."
"Ah, so that's why you've got that look in your eye!" Bdubs slaps his shoulder heartily. "All frustrated, like you're solving a puzzle."
Scar produces his keys from his pocket, nodding as he lets himself and Bdubs into his personal studio. It's not much more than a regular office, but he's filled it with art supplies, and the boss man told him he gets to wreck it just like a real studio. The company can pay to refurbish the space when they need it.
"Yeah, I…" he thinks about what to tell Bdubs. "There was a man, a priest. I don't want to sound crazy, but I think I've found my muse."
Bdubs barks out a laugh. "Haha! Sorry Scar, but you do sound a little bit crazy, if not just like yourself. You'd tell any guy he's your muse if it got him to slip away with you."
Offended, Scar furrows his brow. "No, I mean it! It's got my thoughts turning. Not just my heart."
Bdubs rolls his eyes. "Yeah, your heart, right."
Scar's patience is wearing thin, so he doesn't dignify Bdubs with a response. He just hangs his hat and jacket on the coat rack by the door and sits down behind his table.
Following a half a minute of the silent treatment, Bdubs sighs and steps closer. "Alright, so you've got an idea. What's it of?"
"I'm not sure yet. I was hoping I could just take some time to think it out while I was here, get my ideas together." He pauses and sweeps his current work- a painting of two men having their shoes shined in crisp white collars and thin-checked wool suits- off to the side. "It was like… my eyes were glued to it all. So much color and texture in all of that purple and iridescence. I've never painted materials that are so shiny. I'd love to try."
Bdubs waits as scar pulls out a big sketchbook and sets himself up. "... That's it, as your 'muse'? What about the guy? The priest?"
"I'm still working it out, 'Dubs. I know that I'm drawn to the fabrics and the way it all glowed in the light. Did you know that they have purple fire?"
"Yeah, I looked at it out of my window, a lot of us were watching it down below. Plus, I've seen the Creation Day parade before. It's cool, but it is just a way for them to get people to convert. Etho told me so."
"Well, I don't know, but there's more to it," Scar insists. "Sure, I'm tired of painting suits and shirts over and over again. And I like the visual, um, what's the word? The- the tactile element of it. But it felt like a message. The priest I mentioned, he looked at me. We made eye contact for just a second, and then the stage passed into the sunlight and it was… Well, it was so beautiful. I felt like I saw past it all for a second. Past the suits and the work and the same-old same-old every day, into something that could be more. And it's- it's right here, in the city, all around us all the time!" He looks through Bdubs, eyes unfocusing in favor of recollection. "I want to uncover it and paint it."
Bdubs sits down on one of the stools around the room. "Do you want to talk it through with me? Sure seems like you're out there right now. Maybe having a chat could help you."
"Shouldn't you be working?" Scar bothers, rolling up his shirtsleeves.
"Shouldn't you be working?" he parrots back.
"Okay, fine, you make a point. Well, what do you want to know?"
His friend thinks in silence before responding, pulling the pencil from behind his ear and spinning it between his fingers. "If what you're interested in has to do with the church as a whole, or as a phenomenon, what's the one guy have to do with it? Who's your muse, the church or the priest?"
That does seem to be where Scar is getting hung up. Maybe he's just getting pulled into the Church of the Watcher's public game and the priest is just a pretty, pretty man who Scar saw under the golden egg-yolk sun. His internal compass spins as he thinks.
"I don't know yet. I want to go back and see more. What happened this morning went so fast, it was really almost nothing."
A frown crosses Bdubs' face. "I gotta tell you something though, Scar. You're not going to get with that guy, the priest. They're all celibate, part of their connection to The Watcher. Etho said it's supposedly part of their status, they're very status-obsessed."
Scar knows that Bdubs' partner grew up in a Watcher family and left the church years ago, but beyond that, he's pretty ignorant. "You don't seem to have a positive opinion of the Watchers."
"Well, you shouldn't! They're dangerous. Manipulative. It's all control, wrapped up in shiny purple B.S.," Bdubs argues.
"Don't worry, I'm not going to join their religion. I'm just curious about it. It interests me because it's so different from everything else nowadays. You know what they say, times are changing! We rely on science more and more every day, and we sell the same suits over and over again, and we don't have mysteries. I like the mystery here. I… I think I'm curious about what a person immersed in that world must be like, or what they must see when they look beyond the church. I want to know if he's as curious about my world as I am of his." As he speaks to defend himself, the thoughts finally begin to come together. He could kiss Bdubs if he wasn't so annoying. And married. His thoughts digress.
"Well, be careful," the other insists. "I know I can't stop you, you awful, stupid, stubborn man. But don't get hurt." Finally, he offers a kind, encouraging smile. "And don't do anything to put yourself in a position to get hurt, either," he tacks on like the mother hen he is.
"Jeez, have some faith in me," Scar laughs, knowing that Bdubs means well and that he does have a track record of being a little thoughtless now and again. Or if nothing else, very clumsy.
What can he say, he's just a man, with strengths and weaknesses.
"I do! I don't get it, and it concerns me because of what I know about the stupid Watchers, but I know you're slippery as a snake, too. I've warned you and now you're gonna go out there and make your painting." He stands up and walks over to clap Scar on the shoulder again. "And if it goes wrong and Mr. Priest breaks your heart or you embarrass yourself to death, ole' Bdubs'll be right here to say 'I told you so,'" he grins.
"Yep, you're right." Scar picks up a charcoal and begins drawing figural shapes. "Now, get out of my studio and back to yours. I've got to focus if I'm going to pull this together."
Bdubs chuckles and makes his way over to the door. Before he leaves, he tacks on, "I don't care how immersed in your crazy new project you are, you don't get to flake on lunch today. I'm going to come get you from here at 12:30 and if you resist, I'll tell Joan you were late."
Scar blinks and goes to reply, but his friend closes the door behind him before he can mutter out, "She didn't already know?"