Marion
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (4, 4, 4, 5, 9) ( success x 1 )
Marion
[Marion's Perception + Alertness]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 2, 3, 7) ( success x 1 )
Marion
[One more Perception + Alertness]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 8, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
the call to a quest
Marion's had a day. That's how we'll put it so far. Just that: a day. The guy who was supposed to show up after him at the gas station never came by and he'd waited and waited and there hadn't even been a phonecall until two hours in when Marion's boss called to tell him that Steven was dead and could he stay until eight instead.
As he was taking that phonecall, safe behind the metal grate that separated him from the people filling up until they wanted to pay, something drew his attention all right. There was this cowboy, sun-weathered, brown-haired, skin like the sun's afraid to burn it or like burnt sugar, and he was just filling up his truck but Marion could've sworn something was going on. The hairs on the back of his neck went up, see, because he got a vibe from the man, a creepsome, bottom-of-your-stomach-drops-out icy sort of vibe, even though there was no reason for it at all. Maybe he'd gone out there to check things out, or maybe he'd stayed inside, but it all seemed okay. After the cowboy drove away, Marion noticed the guy's credit card just sitting there. Maybe he went over to get it, maybe he didn't. If he didn't, it came to him anyway, some good samaritan bringing it over. When he touched it, he felt that weird creepy-crawly ice feeling again, like something was sinking, draining out've him.
But that wasn't the only kind-of strange thing that happened today, either. It was a day for hunches, for cold spots. He was scoping out the scene of some night's petty crime when he got the definite feeling that something Not Right was just waiting behind this one stretch of fence. This is one of those moments where as soon as he starts looking around he notices a lot more than maybe he'd feel good about noticing: like - that Feeling, that Hunch, it's all localized around this drip of shadow. The shadow should be a natural shadow, shouldn't it, but it doesn't feel like that at all. There's something wrong there, and if he touches the fence, he'll feel the ghost of some internal gleam [Magick (He doesn't know that yet)] in the metal. Fleeting, fleeing.
Behind the fence - maybe this is a construction site, maybe it's a tenament, a place that is going to be condemned soon - he notices an emaciated figure, sharp as a needle, face hidden by a hood of rags nothing but darkness as black as the shadow there, and he notices that the emaciated figure's Not Shaped Right and that Now Is A Good Time To Leave. Maybe he'll look away, or maybe he'll call out, or maybe he'll just back away quickly, but it's gone as soon as he blinks, and there's a wind that's coming from nowhere that makes sense. He notices that, too.
Some cat almost gets run over in front of him - maybe he almost runs over the cat - on the way home.
His neighbors' door looks like it got attacked by somebody angry with a pipe, which isn't too, too unusual, and somebody downstairs is playing music too loud.
Marion
Steven was always doing stupid shit, not that Marion could be much of a preacher on the subject of intelligent decisions. There was the time that Steven locked himself out of the security cage and had to hide in the bathroom while the place got ransacked. There was also the time when he tried to heat up his dinner in the microwave, wrapped in tinfoil and had half the firemen in Denver surrounding the place. The loss of business that day was astronomical, but by far his most common annoying act was his regular poor excuses for being late. So when Marion took that phone call his response was: "Again? How did he die this time? What do you mean 'for real dead'? Jesus, I have shit to do you know. And there's this cowboy..- Forget it." By the time he got home he had stolen a box of burritos out of spite, been scared half to death by some very strange shit and nearly run over a cat.
That would be just his luck. But he missed the cat, and when he put half an hour between him and the emaciated figure, suddenly that figure was just a blur or maybe a shadow or a homeless man who was just kicking his can down the street waiting for a bus ride to nowhere in particular. His mind had somewhat more trouble rationalizing his broken neighbors door.
"Freddy?" He called out from the hall, inwardly cursing the loud music downstairs. He could pretend he never saw the door and make sure to lock his better, hide under the couch or turn the TV up really loud. "I'm all out of curiosity today, Freddy." He called out again, then nudged the door ajar with the toe of his boot, hands full with the box of burritos he still wasn't sure what he was going to do with.
Marion
[Perception + Alertness]
Dice: 5 d10 TN5 (1, 4, 5, 6, 8) ( success x 3 )
the call to a quest
[Mystery Roll.]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 1 )
Marion
[Perception + Awareness]
Dice: 5 d10 TN5 (3, 4, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
the call to a quest
The door swings just a little bit open when he nudges it with the toe of his boot. Let's give Marion credit where credit is due -- he's sharp, right now. Sharp as a tack. The music from downstairs makes it tricky to hear anything, especially the small sounds somebody might make if they were in trouble, but he catches what sounds like a scuffling, anyway, a dull thump thump, and looking through the crack a couple things jump out at him. Keys on the floor, like somebody dropped them there. A tear in the carpet that doesn't have that been-here-forever look that carpets sometimes get, because this one looks raw. Lights're out. If he leans toward the door a little, get a better look at the other side of what he can see through that crack, he'll see Freddy's ugly cat-tail clock with the big moon eyes, the time stopped. He knows crime, too, Marion - doesn't he? But it doesn't feel like a robbery, it feels like something else.
And then --
oh, he knows this. He knows it in his heart of hearts, some part of him, he knows it in his bones.
-- he just knows there are three people in that apartment. He doesn't know what they're feeling or what they're thinking but he feels like he almost does. Like he's just listening to them talking through a wall, but not enough to really get a tone, and he knows, knows, knows there are three, even though [except for that brief scruff-scrape] it's dead silent in Freddy's apartment.
None of his business.
Marion
Shit. Three people. At the same instant that he knew, he was wondering how he knew. That sort of perception wasn't something that Marion was used to, but he put it down to shadows or movement or the density of the air or any number of things he didn't really care about right then. Fact of the matter was there were three people in Freddy's apartment and they didn't seem like they were invited. They had also broken his clock, which was pretty rude. Cops? Cops wouldn't have taken a pipe to the door, they would have just busted it in with one of those battering ram things they have on all the cop shows. Why would cops be in there anyway? Freddy was a nobody. Maybe they were gang bangers. Maybe they got the wrong address. His internal monologue became external without his go-ahead.
"Shit." The burritos dashed to the floor and spilled out of the box, one of them popped its wrapping and spurted on the carpet like a cancerous tuber. He took a sharp turn towards his own door and started fumbling in his pockets for his keys. The credit card scratched in his fingertips followed by the jingling he was looking for.
Get inside. Lock the door. Then what? Then you're stuck like a rat in a cage. He put his shoulder into the door and made to heave the clunky old thing open.
Marion
[oh dear]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )
Marion
[Willpower]
Dice: 5 d10 TN8 (1, 3, 5, 8, 9) ( success x 2 )
the call to a quest
He knows that one of the people inside starts moving once he says (thinks [he doesn't think he says aloud]) 'shit.' He knows that person - that Mind, those Thoughts - is coming closer to the door. He even notices - can feel, can deduce based on what he feels - that at least that person is interested in him. Part of him knows that if he were to try to focus, maybe, maybe he could -- there's more, isn't there? But the other part of him is the part of him that says don't wonder how you know strange things don't worry about it when your perception goes sillystrange because that's unnatural just believe in the way we told you to believe and the world will be safe and you will be safe.
Get inside. Lock the door. The door opens with more force than necessary, but it's just because he was hasty, and he falls into his apartment. There's a moment of frustration, maybe, as he realizes that the doorframe to his apartment has warped, and his fingertips tingle, the back of his teeth suddenly shrill-sharp like he bit into ice cream. But the lock still clicks into place. Hell, if he's got a deadbolt, that slides into place real smooth, and the chain fits into place just as neatly as the hypothetical deadbolt might've been smooth.
He knows, this, too. There is still somebody standing by Freddy's door. He knows, as soon as his locks click into place, that this same person is standing in the hall. Don't think about it.
That one of the others is leaving the third person behind and following, toward the door, but in a meander-y way. There's nothing in his apartment except for himself. He's got a shine; different from the others. Maybe because he's himself. Maybe because he's having a nervous breakdown, trusting to hunches, and this is all bullshit, or this is just what happens when you've had a shit day and you're trusting to luck.
Marion
He half tripped on the way in. He steadied himself on the wall beside him and at the same time flicked on the light switch bathing everything in the dull glow of a power saving bulb. Someone was right behind him, one of those people from Freddy's room. He could.. feel the person in the hall, maybe wondering why there was burrito in their boot, or maybe wondering something more sinister. The casualness of the 'others' movements was dangerous in his mind. Nobody in this situation should be that calm.
Marion moved quickly across the room after sliding in the dead bolt on the door. He threw back the curtains to his single window and lifted it up. Nothing but a long drop to the pavement below. What was he expecting? He had looked out that same window every day for the last two years. He opened a draw beside his bed and pulled out the revolver lying inside it. The thing felt awkward and all the more useless for it in his hand. He tucked it into his pants and pulled his shirt down over the top of it. Something weird was going on and the gun wasn't going to help. He knew that like he knew two of the three people were moving outside his door.
Where to now? If he jumped out the window he was dead. But maybe the 'others' weren't here for him. He stood in the middle of the room, listening, like his ears were the source of the information. They knew he was there. Hiding wasn't going to do anything. He had to trust the door would hold, at least for awhile.
"You looking for Freddy?" He called out through the door to the person in the hall.
Marion
[Oh and a dice]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (3) ( fail )
the call to a quest
[WP.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 2, 4, 8) ( success x 1 )
Marion
[Willpower]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 7, 7, 9) ( success x 3 )
the call to a quest
There is a brief internal struggle, and it's not really like something that isn't him is trying to push him, to command him, to drag him down into sleep, to force him to exert himself and - no, it's not really like that. But at the same time, it is - and maybe Marion feels his control over his own life slipping. Either way, he gets control of it back, and what he chooses to do is trust his gut. Trust the hunches. Trust his perception. His intuition, whatever. The fact that he can 'feel' those people.
Whoever's in the hall doesn't answer, but doesn't move either. Just stands there. Whoever's still in Freddy's apartment, excepting that third person who isn't moving around very much, leans against the wall that borders Marion's own wall. He can look at a spot in his wall and see right where that second person might be. He can practically see the shadow of them there, though the wall remains a wall. The universe doesn't give him the ability to see through it.
Not yet, anyway.
Marion
He had his phone out and against his ear, the female on the other end wasn't used to being asked for help but hopefully something in Marion's voice made her realize he wasn't playing around. "Sally, it's John. I need you to stop by my apartment, wait out front with the engine going. What? No I didn't rob the gas station. I just need a quick get-away. Neighbor troubles. I'm not whispering." He was, in fact, whispering but he didn't want to tell Sally Turner that he was whispering because he was 'watching' someone try to listen to him directly through an apartment wall.
"Hey you figure out what you're here for yet?" He called out to the hall, terminating the call.
Marion really wished whoever was out there would start talking. The silence was making him nervous.
the call to a quest
[Another WP-contest. I want you to listen to me.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )
Marion
[Willpower]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 8, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
the call to a quest
This time it's closer, that internal struggle, and maybe he has to grab the phone a little more intently. This wave of weariness just - it starts behind Marion's eyes; his vision wavers. But not whatever it is that gives him this unerring compass sense of other people there there and - oh. Wait no. Now there are only two people. The third didn't move anywhere; it's just - there's no mind there anymore.
The person in the hall finally says something; it sounds really low, like it's not directed to him - and it's punctuated by laughter.
Then whoever's in the hall starts to move away. The guy who was in Freddy's apartment - Marion knows he's in the hall now.
Against all of this, this stuff he's trying to pay attention to, minutes tick-tick-ticking away, each second counts, Sally's voice probably strikes him as too loud. Doubtfully, she says, "John, I hope you're being straight with me, because after last time..."
Then she hangs up. Help is on the way?
Marion
The word hope made him.. hope. But the laughter made him sick to his stomach. Sally was gone from the other end of the call before he could even come up with a witty reply and instead of trusting his strange new perceptions he followed the 'others' progress the old fashioned way. His ear pressed to the hard-wood door and he fought the urge to ask whoever mumbled: 'what was that?'
Instead he made another call. His voice was rough and hissing, whispering like he was an asshole in a movie theater.
"Rusty! Sally's going to drop me round. Don't go outside. I think they're onto us. Just make sure the back window is unlocked." Rusty had a house his mother left him in her will. He could stay there a few days, maybe get in contact with the drug supplier, try make a deal. There had to be a way out of this. Or was he just being paranoid? He clicked the hangup button on his phone and listened to the hall again.
the call to a quest
[Willpower contest?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 7, 8, 8, 9) ( success x 4 )
Marion
[Willpower]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 6, 7, 8) ( success x 3 )
the call to a quest
Part of him has to wonder what happened to the third guy. The third guy who just sort of blinked out. Part of him has to wonder how they found him, if it really is Them, these guys in the hall.
Rusty hadn't picked up; Marion had been talking to Rusty's answering machine. But maybe - well - hell. He just stops searching for answers for a second, at least not in the way he'd been searching, and when he focuses his attention on the physical that's where All of his Attention goes.
He can hear them leaving. He can't feel them anymore, but he doesn't think they're still in the hall.
He's not sure.
Before he can start to do anything about it, it's that internal struggle again - that internal push, that Self-wrestling-Self, whatever - and the wave of exhaustion just comes right up and suckerpunches him in spite of his best intentions.
That's the road to Hell, you know.
Speaking of the road to Hell, where is he now? He's on the road to Hell. Or - no. He's on a road somewhere in Colorado, somewhere that's all Desert and Grasses, somewhere that looks like it's going forever. The sky's shading toward evening, and there's a ranch in the distance. A rickety lean-to sort of ranch, looks like part of it was burned at some point, and burned bad.
Marion
In truth he had been almost glad when he had stopped 'sensing' the third individual. All of it was starting to freak him out just a bit more than he liked. Which was a shame because the 'freakishness' had just gotten warmed up. He was reaching for the door, or maybe it was already open. He couldn't really tell. His eyes were swimming and he had that sick feeling in his stomach again but the door wasn't there when he looked at it again and instead of the hallway and the back of some 6'4 goon with a hard-on for punishment, he was staring down a dusty road.
The phone in his hand felt like a dead weight. He shifted it into his pocket and rubbed his free hand over his eyes.
"Okay. So I went out in the hall. Someone hit me with a lead pipe." He touched fingertips to the back of his head and looked at them as if expecting to see blood. He took a step forward and his toe caught on something metallic sticking out of the ground. Brushing away the dust he could just make out the number plate of his ford escort. In the distance the ranch standing. A skeletal husk of ebony shadows. A wind blew across the plains and somewhere in the distance a herd of horses shifted its direction and disappeared with a rattle of tussock.
Somehow his explanation seemed empty.
"Hello?" He called out to the wilderness, called out to the rolling hills mirrored in the sky by pregnant clouds. All of it alien and all the more frightening for it.
the call to a quest
Seems like one of those moments just made for echoes to be all smart-ass and send up a reply. But that doesn't happen. Marion calls to the wilderness and the wilderness doesn't say a damned thing back to him. It just waits. He can feel it waiting, because that's what places like this do. They wait and they're Old and they're between two things.
The road he's on, there's another road practically taken over by dirt and dust and grass, and that one leads toward the ranch and toward the mountains [and the clouds]. Just a few feet away from the license plate of his old ford, there's something else to catch at his attention: something big, and something buried -- something jutting out of the ground, half-concealed by grasses. Time passes. Sure it does. It passes like it does in dreams, and sometimes in life, too. He remembers investigating, learning that whatever was buried wasn't just a Something, but it's his car, stuck in the ground at an angle, corroded and falling apart into rust like it's always been there, green growing out from between the cracks.
Here he is. Utterly himself.
Marion
He was sure the car hadn't been there a moment ago, but now it was and it had always been there. It was just accepted and he felt as if he knew why it was there as well, or how it got there because the two were not necessarily the same thing. His footsteps took him towards the car and his hand brushed along one of the edges.
It was his car so he should have been interested, he should have been curious about it or taken some comfort in the familiar in this other 'place'. But there was no comfort. The wilderness waited and Marion passed by the ford and started up the over-grown path towards the ranch.
He felt like if he turned around the car would be gone or different or something, but he didn't turn around. He kept his eyes on the ranch and a hand in the grass.
the call to a quest
He didn't turn around. He kept walking. And this isn't one of those times where what you walk towards just doesn't seem to be getting any closer, oh definitely not, no. He walks toward the ranch and he does get closer. The grass is sharp, and stings it finger-tips, catches on calluses; he can see the individual boards, see where the ranch is falling to rot. He can see the tree that's half-hidden behind it, a spreading oak, and he can see the rope hanging from it, the old cinderblock beneath the rope kicked over. But that's just a silhouette behind a silhouette. The clouds move quickly; there's a patch of starry sky. Here are more silhouettes:
A star falling becomes a crow, dropping down from seems the sky itself, perching on the top of the ranch, blending into how dark it is. Another star falls except no it's a crow dropping down, and then another, and another, and another, one after the other, but without a sound. They just join the building, become part of it, see?
The voice comes out of the silence like a bullet outta the barrel of a gun; like a clap of thunder, see? Like - suddenly this: "BOY. HURRY UP. GET OVER HERE."
The ranch has a door; it opened and now there's someone standing there, feet planted in the earth. The crows whisper amongst themselves but they're not really audible; maybe it's just the wind whispering through the grass.
Marion
He stopped to watch the star. He watched it change though it wasn't any sort of describable transformation. One ended and the other began but neither was ever truly non-existent. A second, then a third. He stood transfixed until the weight of the living shadow perching on and around the ranch was too heavy on his eyes. The black was too deep and out of it opened the door like a mouth. He could hear the twisting of the rope hanging from the old tree behind the house. He could feel the solidity of the cinder block. He could look up and see the stars through the open hole in the clouds.
Then the voice snapped like fingertips and his head whipped towards the open door. He hated that. He hated when people called him boy. He felt like it was more to do with them telling him what they weren't than what he was. He didn't need that sort of insight.
"This is bullshit!" He called out sounding more like that which he had been called every second. His eyes rose up from the boots in the doorway to the 'someone' wearing them. His hand in his pocket absently flipped the credit card over and over.
"Why is my car buried back there?" And this time he did turn and look over his shoulder for a brief second.
the call to a quest
The man steps out've from under the shadow of the door and maybe his appearance gives Marion a jolt. He doesn't seem to fit (yes, he does) the surroundings. He's about the same height as Marion, about the same build, he's got the same potential for handsomeness, though on this man it's kind of hard to see - like he's a mirror that got battered up, scratched and clouded by cracks and chinks. His skin's harsh, as weathered as any western's hero (or villain), and his hair's got threads of the iron in it. He doesn't stop at one step, either, impatience and irritation dogging his shadow, informing every line of him. The hell's he wearing, huh? He looks like the apocalypse happened; he looks like he's been on the road for a long, long old time, questing for something, and he's just grabbed pieces of clothing as he went. Mostly leather, some metal clasps and buckles here and there, thick wool coat on over a leather duster, like he feels a chill that isn't even here, and it's as gray as water.
And all that isn't necessarily what one notices about the man, either. The resemblance: well, maybe that jars Marion. The man's still too far away for Marion to get a good look at his face, and when the shadows that hid the man's eye move because the man's moved, Marion can see that one of them's closed, just a socket, eyelids puckered scar-stitched shut.
The other eye is bright, though - as bright as crows and stars.
"You're right about one thing, kid. This is fucking bullshit. Just what do you think you're pulling? Tell me how even when you're trying to figure something, you're hiding. Tell me how hiding like that's gonna make us strong. Tell me how the fuck it happens your ears are so stoppered this is the first time you've ever fucking answered, huh? Tell me what's in there. It ain't wax. Is it shit? Did you just get real full of shit growing up and you need someone to teach you how to take a crap like a man?"
Marion
He had his gun out of the back of his trousers and pointed at the older man as he advanced. The gun felt just as awkward and useless when he held it in this world as it did in the real one. Every time he drew his gun he wished he had put more time into learning how to use it but who the hell wants to spend their time off at the shooting range? He liked to think he was an optimist. He never learned how to use it very well because he would never need it. That's it. His hand shook.
"What the fuck are you talking about?"
But the man kept talking.
"Shut up." And again. "Shut up." As the man got closer, Marion got a good look at him and he felt that sick feeling in his stomach yet again. "What the hell are you wearing?" He felt a snort of nervous laughter rise up behind his words and he let it out. "Is that what you do? Crap like a man?" He waved the gun at him. "None of this is real anyway. See?"
And he fired a shot blindly.
Marion
[Dexterity+firearms]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 7, 8) ( success x 2 )
Marion
[Damage Roll]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 8, 9) ( success x 2 )
the call to a quest
He fires blindly; he still manages to hit his target. The man grunts. His body jerks; there's a Frank Miller-esque spray of blood. In reality, a gunshot wound really hurts and you don't just bounce back from it. But in reality, the man isn't a man. He looks at his side, where the bullet when in, then looks at Marion, and laughs - this dry husk sound, this terrible sound, because one of his lungs is collapsed - and then he snaps the fingers of his left hand.
Everything gets really, really slow. Marion, if he tries to do anything, feels like he's barely moving at all. He sees the bullet leave the man's body, go backwards, crawl across the air, sees his own hand re-tracing its old familiar gestures, sees the bullet return to its home in the revolver's barrel and go all the back to--
"None of this is real anyway." He's saying that. Marion. Even though he might not want to. He already said it. It's happening again, and he knows it's happening again. "See?" And he fired a shot blindly.
But the man wasn't in the same place. The man was three steps over that-a-way, and he had his hand on his own weapon: something that looked, to Marion's eyes, like it was from the future, hanging there at the man's side.
"Don't be such a shitstain," the man says, "and maybe we can negotiate 'reality.'"
Marion
It took time for him to react, because in this instance of time Marion was looking at the man and then he simply wasn't. Marion was looking alright, but the man wasn't there and the bullet was firing off into empty space. He heard the voice before he saw him again and when he turned his head to the location of the voice he let out a startled: "Shit!" And dropped the gun in the dirt at his feet.
"What the fuck man!"
Though this was a dream, apparently Marion expected there to be some semblance of normality within it. Like, people wouldn't just teleport.
"What the hell do you want from me?" He asks, eyes on the weapon in the other man's hand. "Is this some sort of high tech interrogation? Look you can tell your boss I don't have his money. It's not hidden anywhere. I just don't have it."
the call to a quest
"That certainly seems to be the case," the man drawls, looking Marion over in a way that leaves no doubt what he means is that Marion doesn't have 'it' in a more spiritual sense and 'it' is definitely not money. "I want you to saddle the fuck up. Quit lurking around like you're nothing. Quit being so content to be a worthless puddle of piss, a vulture pickin' at the bones of better people. You're more," and here, his voice is resonant. And here's the thing, too: it touches a chord in Marion; it is something that feels right, even if it sounds crazy. "Or you could be, if you weren't such a sad sack'a. Use your senses. Look for help, if you can't do it yourself. Ask me what to do. Just - "
Marion has a chance here to make a decision. Somebody's shaking him awake. He can open his eyes, if he wants. Leave behind this weird dream-world that feels different than a dream, somehow, but is still a dream [vision] nonetheless.
Marion
He could feel himself being pulled away but something the man said had triggered a switch inside him. 'You're more', like he could have possibly known that. Nobody had ever told him he was more and meant it the way the man seemed to have.
"Wait," he said and there was a sense of urgency to his voice that had previously been missing. "Wait I'm-" and he blinked, raising a hand to his eyes to rub at his orbitals.
"What do you mean I'm more?" He took a step forward though he felt himself fading. "What the fuck do you know about me?" There was bite to his words, perhaps a glimmer of what the other man was looking for. Though fleeting.
the call to a quest
There's a shadow. Those crows that fell outta the stars; they're lifting from the ranch roof with a sound like a rapid heartbeat. What the fuck do you know about me?
The man says: "Everything, kid. I know everything there ever was and will be, and I am not full of shit. So why don't you figure it," and then -
Then Marion's on the floor of his apartment, and Sally's kneeling next to him, her bottle strawberry-blonde hair pulled up in a knot and her eyes ringed in shadow and eyeliner and maybe too much mascara. Makes her look older. She's just given up shaking him, and she looks scared, covering her face with her right hand.
Marion
He watched the crows and he listened to the man who wasn't him but felt very familiar tell him that he knew everything and for some reason he believed him. But before he could ask him what 'everything' meant, his eyes snapped open to the dreary light of his apartment floor.
Marion let out a grunt, then a cough like he had half drowned. He moaned something and rolled onto his side and then without warning he threw up all over the shoe mat he had tripped on when he entered his apartment. A migraine rocked through his brain like a freight train and everything seemed to swim. In the waves he could just make out Sally's hair and the makeup that said she was probably working when he called her. That was never a good thing.
He wiped his mouth and tried to smile. "Hey." He tried to laugh and ended up regretting it. As his senses returned he started to remember why he was lying on the floor in the first place and he reached out a hand for her. "I know I'm real manly and all that but would you mind giving me a hand? I feel like the floor's about to rise up and smack me in the face again."
the call to a quest
There is something come hither - but tired come hither, cum hither boye - about her outfit: what he can see of it underneath the hoodie she threw on when she decided to get out and see what the fuck was taking him so long. So yeah, it's a safe bet she was working when he called, and it's a safe bet that she's surprised when he rolls over. He tries to laugh and Sally says - low - "shit" - and then gets up and reaches down to give him a hand.
"Warn you there's no guarantee I won't smack you in the face once you get up," she says, but her hand is warm. She still looks scared. "John," she says, "I think maybe something bad happened to your neighbor. You maybe wanna call the cops."
"Did they come in and hassle you, or what. What happened?" He can see her looking him over, like she's trying to figure out how he ended up on the floor.
Marion
He wasn't all that helpful when she tried to pull him up so chances are it turned into an ordeal, but eventually he stood upright and reached out a hand to support himself on the wall. He wasn't listening. He was looking out into the hall and waiting, dreading the return of that.. feeling.. when he could 'sense' the others. But it wasn't there and so he breathed out once very slowly and then his chin shot up.
"What? No- no cops." But then if he didn't call they're were going to want to know where he was. But then if he did call they were going to want to know a whole lot more. A whole lot more about shit he didn't really have a clue how to answer.
"No cops," he confirmed. "Just take me to Rusty's." He took a tentative step out into the hall and at the same time checked his phone to see if Rusty had left any messages.
"You can stop looking at me like that, I just got hit or something." But there didn't seem to be any bruising or obvious signs of trauma. "Whatever Fred was into is none of our business."
the call to a quest
'That' was all big eyes, and wary disappointment edged in anger. "If you don't call they're going to eventually wonder why you didn't call, hon," Sally says, "but fine. Do whatever the fuck you like. What am I, just your chauffeur, like I need this shit."
She turns on her heel and heads into the hall; pauses to say over her shoulder, "You coming?"
It's going to be a quiet ride to Rusty's.
No comments:
Post a Comment