Vanessa &Jake | BACKDATED

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After Jean-Paul asks her to check up on Jake and whether or not he's properly informed people of his situation she finally tracks the other shapeshifter down.

After a few days of attempting to stake out the mansion and search it for the shapeshifter Vanessa had given up that venue. Either he wasn't staying at the mansion or Jake had gotten stealthier since they'd worked together. That left her to systematically go through his haunts she knew in the city. The thing about working with the people at Snow Valley was that you got to know one another's habits fairly well. After all, sometimes you needed to grab someone and run. Other times you just went looking for coffee someone else made at the same time.

It was Jake's love of pastries that led her to the infamous "stoner bakery." She didn't know the name of the damn thing and she'd never been there before but Adrienne along with enough of the brownstone residents had been so it wasn't hard to find it. The problem, sadly, was that Jake wasn't to be found there. She'd thought for a moment he was, but that guy just had dark hair and what looked like a longer version of Jake's haircut.

Except that Jake actually was to be found there. Jake 2.0, if you will. Who just happened to forget about the 2.0 face he was wearing as he enjoyed that morning's coffee and Boston Creme. He lifted one hand in wave toward her as she looked over, half moving in his seat to show the intention to stand and greet without actually expending the effort.

A white eyebrow arched in a rather aristocratic manner. Clearly the expression wasn't her own but one she'd learnt to impersonate someone else. The man who could have been Jake from the back was waving at her. In fact, he was doing so with a level of familiarity that only very skilled liars and actors managed with strangers. Of course, if you weren't a stranger you didn't need to fake it. With the half-smirk on her face she'd adopted with the Morgan persona, Vanessa sauntered up to the man's table.

A blue hand curled around the back of the chair across from him and Vanessa smiled. It was Morgan's smile, not her own, but one Jake would have known. "Hey, love. Up to sugary conquest?" The familiarity in her tone, her expression and her body language was flawless, but then Vanessa was a very skilled liar.

"I've never met a confectionery that couldn't be tamed," was Jake's response, as he waved at the empty seat across the table. Not so much lie as forgetfulness, his demeanor also familiar as he slipped into the normal routine. "How'd you find me?"

Vanessa slipped into the offered seat and shrugged a little. "I heard you were about again, oh disappearing one. Staked out the mansion but never found you there so I started to hit up your haunts." She grinned then and this expression was all Vanessa, something Jake had never known much. The smile spread fully across her lips and there was something very mischievous to her eyes, though not at all sexual the way it would have been with Morgan. "I like the new face. Fancy a change and decided you didn't want to go too extreme? I would've gone a little more exotic. Latino maybe. I hear straight chicks love Latin men. I always have to beat them off of Daniel."

"New fac--damn," Jake slipped, realizing his mistake. "I'm...transitioning, I guess, but the back and forth is killing me. Never really been able to get used to a Latino face staring back from the mirror, but maybe if you want to help me pick one out."

He glanced down at the donut, then back up at her, not bothering to hide a grin. "Creme-filled, or I'd offer to split it with you. And yeah, I haven't been spending much time at the mansion. Some folk have been...well, less than enthused to have me back," he concluded, finally deciding to leave it at that.

"We could work on it. The face, that is. I'm not a fan of doughnuts." She refrained from stating she wasn't a fan of pastries in general in case Jake decided to feign a heart attack. Or have a real one. "That lack of enthusiasm have anything to do with the people who want to track your sweet ass down? If you're going for more discreet you might want to consider a new face that's less..." Vanessa trailed off while she tried to figure out an appropriate term. "Attractive. Attractive blokes never fly under the radar."

"Few people, that's probably it. For others..." Jake trailed, then finally shrugged it off. "Well, if it wasn't that, there'd be some reason or another. And what's the point of being a shapeshifter if you're not forever young and beautiful?" To prove the point, he picked up the doughnut and took a big bite, accompanied by a long "Mmmmm...."

"Have you told anyone about the people who are so eager to get a piece of you?" 'Piece' was likely the wrong word to use with a man who had gotten his arm cut off once so people could play mad scientist with it, but Vanessa wasn't one to cater to sensitivities at the best of times. The people whose feelings she genuinely cared about hurting could be counted on one hand. Jake was somewhere on the third or fourth hand at best.

"Remy. In exchange for another piece of me," Jake replied. "A piece of my soul. The very last one. It's official now--I have no soul."

"That's okay, you weren't using it anyway," she returned with an amused smile. "What's LeBeau going to do with a piece of soul? Auction it off? Make it dress up pretty and do a sexy dance for him?"

"I think he has a collection of them somewhere. Probably all bottled up in formaldehyde." was Jake's opinion. "But yeah, I'm better off without it. Soul's are pesky little things. Almost as bad as that conscience thing people refer to. Sold that off years ago. Never looked back."

"Yeah, consciences do get in the way. You sure your hasn't gone back, though? They do that sometimes. Like tumors." She'd known Jake to have an inconvenient moment of conscience here or there in the past. Then again, having one of those really was a bother some of the time. Self-preservation worked much more effectively when you didn't much care who you threw in the way of oncoming attacks to save yourself.

"Oh, I hope not. Maybe I should have someone scan for that," Jake grinned in response. "Got enough on my mind without...guilt or whatever they're calling it these days," he said, with obvious distaste at the word.

"I think you need an MRI for that. Maybe a CAT scan," she told him thoughtfully. "I hear these days they can remove your conscience with a laser. It helps cauterize so it's not so likely to grow back."

"Sad, but I never seem to stay cauterized for long," Jake shrugged. "Point me in the right direction, though, and I'll just Shift it away." He paused, licking a bit of doughnut creme from his thumb. "So what're you up to these days?"

"Oh, y'know," she began casually. "Just the usual. I'm balancing life as a high price call girl with life as a low-paid exotic dancer and on the side I dress up like a dominatrix and save the world. It's all very dull. Maybe more ring gags involved in the world saving would help." Vanessa pretended to give this a moment of serious contemplation before tilting her head and refocusing on Jake. "What do you think?"

"Everyone likes a good ring gag," Jake grinned. "I once saw this one using those colored magician's scarves..." He let the thought trail off, incomplete. "Well, I think saving the world's a bit overrated. Seems everyone's doing it these days."

"There is a high concentration of cape-wearing types about, isn't there?" She sounded as if she didn't approve and made a tsking sound as she shook her head. "You reckon there's an anti-hero market that doesn't involve being a villain? Seems like there'd be fewer of them about, at least. Less saturation in the job market and all."

"Villains have all the best lines," Jake commented forlornly. "But I could never quite get the maniacal laugh down right, so I had to join the good guys instead. This anti-hero concept has promise, however. We could definitely make for a dastardly duo. I'll need to check the terms of my contract to see when it's up."

"Hm..." Vanessa tapped a long finger against her chin as she considered something. "The laugh will be a problem. We might have to Robin Hood it. Y'know, commit crimes to help others. The lack of conscience would be useful, the maniacal laugh wouldn't be necessary. Smarmy might need to be part of the general schtick, especially on the illegal side of our antihero do gooding antics. How are you at smarmy?"

"Fawning smarmy, or sleazy smarmy?" Jake started to ask, then held up a hand. "Never mind, I can do both. Even better when it's at the same time. Throw in a head of greasy hair, and the rich just throw money to get you to leave. Of which, of course, 100% of their donations go to feed starving children in Africa. Except replace Africa with New York and starving children with me. And throw doughnuts in there somewhere. Of course, these talents can certainly be turned to do gooding," he added, before popping the last bite of said doughnut in his mouth.

"You're hired! When can you start?" Vanessa couldn't help the laughter. Honestly, she'd kind of missed Jake and his random bouts of ridiculous. Well, did ninety percent of the time count as a "bout"? She'd never hung out with her coworkers much aside from Amanda so it'd been easy to forget that Jake was actually fun to be around.

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves," Jake cautioned, wagging a finger at her. "I mean, we haven't talked benefits yet. I could never work anywhere that didn't have doughnut Fridays." Jake couldn't help smiling either, a relaxed indication of enjoyment. True, not everyone, but more of these mini-reunions than not had him on trial for...well, the perfectly normal patterns of his comings and goings. Nearly as predictable as to be migratory. Another smile slipped out, and he just nodded at her. "It's good to see you again, Morgan."

Jake got himself a funny look and those solid red eyes narrowed at him. Vanessa leaned over the table a bit and pretended to inspect him. "Doughnut Fridays? I think I need to have a feral sniff your butt or wherever it is they smell to make sure a person's a person." That brought the unfortunate mental image of Logan sniffing Jake's ass to mind. The look on her face was mildly disgusted. At least with the mental substitution of Laura it was funny. "I expected doughnuts to be a daily demand. If you tell me you have embraced healthy breakfasts I'm sending someone out to check your DNA or some such."

A smile spread across her face as she leaned back in her chair again. Really, demanding doughnuts just on Friday...it was just weird. "Aye, it's good seeing you, too, love. But you might as well use my actual name. Most of the people I talk to most of the time do anyway."
Well, the truth is, the other days got expense reported. Fridays just demanded that extra doorstep delivery. Jake paused at her comment, wheels turning. "Ok, Vanessa it is," he says, work mode kicking in a moment, with the associated barely perceptible tension, as he made the mental adjustments. "Still Jake here, despite the new face. Nostalgia, I guess. Not like I can't be trained to answer to another name, but...I like Jake."

"I'm willing to bet your training would fall apart in the face of a well-placed pastry anyway," she joked. After all, he'd forgotten all about the other face he was wearing. "Besides, I like Jake. It's a good name. It goes well with the new face. Which...are you keeping it? I mean, in a default view sort of way. Are you keeping this one or trying it out to see if you want to keep it? Or are you going to end up being as annoying as me and people will need to learn three new faces and bodies for you?" Though he'd likely be less annoying than her and not have new accents, names and mannerisms to go along with them all. Some days Vanessa wondered if she didn't really have some sort of low level dissociative identity disorder.

Jake shrugged, thinking through the question as he tried to answer it. "I'm not sure, exactly. Right now, I'm using both. Don't think I could ever do your act, though. Too much work, the shifting and the remembering. It's one thing when you're on a job, in work mode, that sorta thing, but around friends..." He trailed off a minute, looking around for his reflection. "It's growing on me, though," he said, catching sight of himself in the window. "Close enough it doesn't take me too long to shift, but who knows, I just might keep it in the end."

"Forsake your real face?" There was faux heartbeat in her voice and a hand clutched over her chest. "Who will break the hearts of young men and women the world over if you go and do that?" Vanessa sighed heavily and collapsed back against the chair as if she were wilting in the process. "I suppose you're just as capable with this face, but it's too strong a jaw to work the boyish charm. You're going to have to change your M.O. here, love." Not that she had any clue about Jake's M.O. when it came to picking up people. Somehow she had two friends who'd been involved with him in one way or another but no actually idea how either had ended up that way.

"Well, he's served me well so far," Jake added with a wink. "Besides...how do you know what's my 'real' face?" There was definitely a tease in his voice, but perhaps just a bit too much for there not to maybe also be a hint of truth as well. "So...soften the jaw or learn to work it. What do you recommend?"

His teasing question only got a sly smirk from Vanessa. The truth was she didn't know that the face she associated with Jake was his real base. What's more is that she hadn't ever assumed it was, she'd just never assumed it wasn't either. If she had Jake's flavor of shifting she'd probably never end up using her own face either. That was so boring.
Bracing her elbows on the table, Vanessa leaned forward again and squinted a little at Jake. "I don't know, what effect are you going for? The old face said you were harmless and it had devastating effect when the smile was employed properly. It was totally teenybopper wet panties sort of cute. This one is more good guy but not so overtly harmless. That could work in your favor if you don't want to scream hey-I-scream-like-a-girl-and-run-from danger! Only people who already know you would know that about you." She grinned, then continued.

"In terms of physical attraction you're going to get an older crowd wanting to take you home with them. I'm guessing you probably had a fair few twenty-somethings hit on you before and then you'd get the people your own age who prefer really youthful beauty. Domineering women who liked being able to keep you under their spiked heel? You might get more of the girls who like to feel safe with this face and less super butch guys. You're going to hit more grey than black or white in who your attract and what you put off. Less pretty, more handsome. I'd go with this to blend. Or if you feel like, well, growing the fuck up a bit and attracting people to you, platonically or otherwise, who have grown up too."

Jake looked surprised at her lengthy answer. "You've...thought this out," he said with a laugh. "Maybe we should conduct a...oh, a social experiment, we could call it. Which face gets the quicker, ah, tumble? Average age, gender, bedroom habits. Mayne introduce a few jaw variables to study their effects." Clearly, growing the fuck up was the last thing on Jake's mind.

Vanessa grinned. "We'll need somewhere better than a pastry shop. And somewhere people aren't as likely to know you." She didn't bother pointing out that she had given him the on the fly analysis of his different faces. If she'd thought about it he might have gotten an essay's worth of information. She stood up and held out her hand to him. "C'mon my doughnut lover, let's see which of your faces we can get laid."

"Obviously, I have much to learn. Lead on, instructor-mine," Jake said with a grin, as he stood, brushing a few crumbs to the floor before letting her lead him out.