[open] you’re on my heart just like a tattoo

[a_shadow]

Who: Artists Agent Texas & Nihlus, plus anyone who wants a tattoo
When: By appointment
Where: The medical wing, which is the location of the tattoo studio
What: Thinking about getting ink, talking about it, actually doing it, whatever
Warnings: None at this time

Tex is sure to be there early before every appointment that was made to ensure everything is ready for the session to come. The tattoo studio is clean and bright—especially compared to the low lighting conditions being kept on the rest of the ship. Patrons are free to choose between her or Nihlus for their artist, and she has a few examples of work they've done on the synthetic skin that she purchased when she got the machine on the resorts of the Collective. On the table is a book of fonts and designs, and people are free to come in and flip through it before their appointments.


(( ooc: feel free to handwave that your character made an appointment, and you can specify Nihlus or Tex as the artist in your tag! ))

Comments

8/1 - closed to Nihlus and Church

[a_shadow]

Tex has been planning this for a long time. She was originally planning to go to one of the tattoo shops there on the Collective to receive it, but though she only had plans for the one piece for now, she wanted to have the freedom to get more tattoos later, if she should decide to. And when she had realized she could buy a machine for the ship, well, that sealed the deal.

It's funny, for someone who tries to ignore sentimentality the way she does, how much getting this tattoo means to her. She never really is successful in doing that, and though she'd tipped her hand to Wash when the subject of tattoos first came up, the symbolism of it still means a lot to her. Even if she also knows it's really only because of Allison and the way she embodies Allison's memories.

After she takes the time to contact Nihlus to cement her appointment time, and after she takes the time to tell Church about the fact that she was doing this, she makes her way to the tattoo studio, braless. She had shown Nihlus her idea when she'd first bought the machine, but she also took the time to download the picture to one of the educational tablets that belonged to the school so he can use it to compare.

[beside_myself]

It takes Church a while to decide if he actually wants to go, but eventually picks yes. If only for the fact that Tex would be pissy if he didn't. When she texted him, telling him that she was going and that she'd like him there, he said no. Because he's Church, and that's what he does: be an asshole. But, here he is, walking down to the new shop, checking his MID to make sure he's not going to be too late.

When he steps into the shop, Tex is already there, and he offers her a small wave. He thinks tattoos are dumb, but he knows that this is important, so he'll sit with her for at least a little while. He hopes she realizes this is the one sentimental moment she gets with him this month. (That's mostly a joke. ... Mostly)

[beautifulspaceraptor]

For his part, Nihlus has been busy double-checking that everything was up to his cleanliness standards and that the tattoo machine was calibrated properly and in good working order. He's currently sitting on the stool next to the re-purposed medical berth, wearing a surgical mask and his civies; a short sleeve, black zip-up shirt and pair of black and orange running leggings.

The trickiest part of the whole ordeal was the gloves. Disposable medical-grade gloves for people with claws and three fingers wasn't exactly an item that was in demand onboard the Moira. It'd taken some fiddling with the fabricator to get the right amount of flex and fit and he still needed to put blunters on his claw tips to stop them from slicing through the thin material.

When Texas enters, he clicks the machine off and looks up, prepared to greet her-

And then blinks when a stranger enters after her.

"Well, hello," he casts Texas a curious look. "You didn't tell me we were getting a spectator. I'd have nabbed an extra chair."

[a_shadow]

Tex glances at Church and continues her way to the studio chair. "He can stand. He'll live." They'd have to sanitize it anyway, if they brought another seat into the room. Tex straddles the seat of the chair to sit in it backwards. Completely unabashed, she pulls her shirt back over her head, keeping the shirt on her arms so that the fabric covers her chest. She then addresses Church: "I thought you said you weren't coming."

[beside_myself]

Church is only a bit affronted by the casual way Tex told him to stand — maybe his legs are tired? How does she know — but he brushes it aside and goes to lean against the wall.

"I thought I'd stop by," he says, shrugging a shoulder. "I don't have anything better to do, so..."

He trails off a bit and eyes up the ... alien that's apparently going to be working with Tex. "What the fuck are you?" Don't ever say he's not racially (specially?) sensitive.

[beautifulspaceraptor]

"I'm a wizard," Nihlus answers cheerily.

Yeah, no, the guy can go ahead and stand.

Setting the tattoo machine down, he fetches a disposable alcohol wipe out of a box of them, talking to Texas while tearing the packaging open.

"I've made several copies of the stencil transfer so we can retry if you don't like the initial placement." He waits until she's settled before leaning over and wiping down her upper back, motions steady and clinical. "The size of the tattoo was just within tolerances for the thermal-fax. If anyone wants something bigger though, I can see about modding it with the fabricator."

[a_shadow]

"Well, gee, I'm glad you could carve the time out for me, Church," she says. She nearly scoffs when Church addresses Nihlus the way he does—there are a lot of different kinds of life forms on this ship and it pays to learn to finesse things a little better than that around here. Or a lot better. But she holds it in. Nihlus has earned her respect for more than one reason, but she doesn't feel the need to tear into Church for being rude to him. Nihlus has handled the situation quite well on his own.

She waits for Nihlus to place the transfer on her back, and once the image is on her skin, she stands with her back to the mirror on the wall and picks up the hand mirror to get a view of her back. She examines the placement of the image for a while before turning her back to Church. "This is what it's going to look like," she says. Except for the fact that the transfer is purple, of course. She turns her head to look at Church over her shoulder. "Does that look centered to you?"

[beside_myself]

Church eyes over the transfer, and then shifts his gaze her shoulders, then arms, then ass. Man, she looks fuckin' great. Focus. She's talking.

"Yeah? I guess?" He shrugs. "I don't know."

Personally, he thinks this is stupid. But it's Tex, and she's going to do whatever the fuck she wants, regardless of his opinion. Doesn't mean he can't voice it though. "Why the fuck are you getting a tattoo, again? That shit's permanent, Tex."

Tex!

[springlocking]

It's funny how a spur-of-the-moment thing ends up meaning so much.

Charlie has her right sleeve rolled up as she walks into the studio, looking thoughtfully between her hand and the place she's never thought to explore before. It's such a small thing, or it probably will be anyway, but she needed to remind herself, to keep remembering. Sammy had lived, he had existed. She had been forced to let go of him once already - but that wouldn't happen again. Not without her knowing something was wrong.

Once she spots Agent Texas, she nods, managing a slight, genuine smile as she walks over. "Thanks again for, you know, for doing this."

[a_shadow]

"It's nothing," she says. "It was just an opportunity that came along and I took it." She's a bit uncomfortable being thanked for something so trivial. But she passes it off with a small smile and turns to finish prepping the work area, laying plastic wrap on the table. Now everything's clean, sanitized, and covered. "Did you bring a diagram of the constellation you want?"

[springlocking]

"Yeah, I did." She holds up a picture, one displaying the lines of the twins. She pauses before muttering, "I...don't want the background, if that's all right. Just the stars, the lines, and the name S-a-m-m-y."

It isn't her name, but it's just as important.

[a_shadow]

"Do you want the stars to be five-pointed like these?" she asks. She wants to be sure to get the image just as it's in Charlie's mind. "And just black, or what color?"

[springlocking]

Five points for five children.

She nods calmly. "Five-pointed stars, all black, please."

[a_shadow]

There are a few more questions she needs to ask to make sure she's giving Charlie exactly what she wants—size and placement and so forth—but once she's sure she has that all in hand she copies the design onto the stencil transfer paper and rubs Charlie's skin in the correct spot with a rubbing alcohol wipe. Last comes transferring the design onto her skin, and Tex gives her the hand mirror that sits nearby. "Look all right?" she asks.

[springlocking]

"Umm..."

Charlie 'hmms' a bit as she looks it over. She may have said something wrong, and she's starting to realize that. Almost sheepishly, she says, "The design's just fine, but I think I got the spot wrong."

Hesitantly, she turns he right palm up and, with the opposite index finger, indicates a spot roughly halfway between the wrist and the hollow of her elbow.

"That's where I meant for it to be."

[a_shadow]

"That's fine. We want to make sure it's exactly how you want it before I ever put a needle to your skin." She removes the stencil and recopies it to a new transfer, then rubs the new copy in the right place. "Good?"

[springlocking]

"Yeah. That's exactly what I had in mind," Charlie notes contently, smiling just a bit at the spot.

[a_shadow]

"All right, good." Tex instructs Charlie on how to sit with her arm held still just so, and then she gets the small amount of ink she will need for this process. Then she turns the machine on. The container she dips the needles into looks like a small bottle cap. "Obviously this is going to hurt a little—I can't do anything about that. You just have to hold still and not hold your breath."

[springlocking]

Charlie looks again at her arm. That's right, it was the left one that Foxy...still, she can probably handle a simple needle. She'll probably have to keep her eyes closed, though.

"I can probably handle it," she notes before closing her eyes. "It isn't like there's going to be a hook in there or anything, right?"

[a_shadow]

"It'll be a steady pressure and movement, but you may feel it more in one spot than in another," Tex says, "since there are some places that might have tendon or bone underneath to make it a bit more sensitive. Just breathe through it if you feel like it's getting intense and let me know so I can let you rest a moment."

hey tex hey

[that_cost]

There's another Charlie in the tattoo studio, this one looking simultaneously wary and determined. She's going to do this. Hell to the fuck yeah she's going to do this. She even spent all night drawing hat she wanted on several different pieces of paper.
Charlie's no artist, so the design is simple enough. Four stars, roughly the same size. They're a basic black outline and each star has initials in them.

A.M
V.M
I.M
N.M

Whoever they are, they're important to her, and she wants her first tattoo to mean something.

So she's holding the paper in one hand, trying her best to not wrinkle it as she studies everything she can see.

[a_shadow]

Tex returns from having a drink of water to find Charlie waiting for her. She's already cleaned things up from the previous session, and she greets Charlie as she comes in. "Looks like you're prepared," she says. "Let me take a look."

[that_cost]

Charlie holds out the paper, stepping back a tad to get a better view of the room. It's interesting and a bit scary, but Charlie's set herself on a mission to reclaim her life and take back experiences she had no control of.

"It's uh...initials of people I lost. My dad, mom, people who took care of me after my parents died. I coulda gone with hearts but..." And a nose wrinkle as she shakes her head. Charlie's not the girly HEARTS ALL OVER type

[a_shadow]

"It's a good choice," Tex says. She herself had gone with a star for her tattoo. It had a certain significance to her, which meant she could respect its use as a symbol. "I am going to draw this on your skin first, so we can get the placement of all the stars right. Where do you want this?"

[that_cost]

Charlie smiles some, somehow glad Texas approves of the tattoo. She points to the inside of her left forearm.

"I was thinking here. I considered the fact that I wear mostly t-shirts, so fabric won't be rubbing on it while it heals."

[a_shadow]

"And you can look at it whenever you want, there," Tex remarks. They have to carefully choose the placement and size of each star, but she sits next to the studio chair and carefully draws them onto Charlie's skin, then releases her so she can inspect the result. "That look good?"

Tex!

[freiheiten]

[Levi has never really thought about getting a tattoo. In his world they were all gotten in dirty shacks with whatever sharp object they could find. This though...this isn't that bad. The lights are bright and it looks to his standards of clean. He is actually pretty excited for this.]

Hey.

[a_shadow]

[ Tex had been flipping through the art book when Levi arrived, but she puts it down and stands when he speaks. ]

Hi. I've been looking forward to you coming.

[freiheiten]

Nice to see you awake.

[....Oh that might have sounded a bit creepy. Anyways.]

Do you have any work of yours I can see?

[a_shadow]

[ Tex had anticipated this—of course, people would want to know what kind of work she could do. ]

I did a lot of work on this synthetic skin I bought with the machine, but I only kept a couple pieces I did. The rest was mostly to get used to the depth, so it was a lot of dots and lines.

[ She pulls the pieces out to display—they're both smaller pieces, less than three inches across, but they show intricacy in the lines and patterns. Being an AI, Tex is capable of reproducing just about any artwork she sees on sight—she was mostly concerned about the actual skill of tattooing when she learned. ]