hostage | EXSILIUM

[What to do. This is such a nuisance. Rin looks furtively back and forth down the hall.

There's... no one around.

Maybe this is stupid. Maybe there's no one here. But she draws her blade, which is not exactly a thing you can do sneakily - though she tries.

Courtesy of the Initiative, this thing has some impressive cutting power. Maybe under the normal course of things Rin could not saw through a whole door, but the sword in her hands responds to her needs and becomes a weapon that is actually pretty intimidating in its ability to slice and slash.

It was definitely not meant to be used as a saw, but it will serve. Rin inserts it perpendicular to the doorframe above the lock. She'll just try cutting out around the lock and pushing it open...]

[There's nothing special about the door, so it's easy to saw through. Meanwhile, inside the bedroom, Jesse is still totally unaware that anything is going on at all. Around him, the room is a filthy mess. He's hardly left it since the outbreak, and he clearly decided at some point that stacking furniture and clothes and random items could somehow protect him, so there's a pile of stuff all around the door. There's surprisingly little evidence of food leftovers - because he hasn't been eating - but a whole lot of drugs. The meth that Rin will recognize is in a bag beside his pipe, on the floor next to the bed. There are also various pills scattered around, some of them ground into powder. And then there's the tranquilizer, a bunch of syringes all within arm's reach.]

[Rin pussyfoots into the apartment. It's laid out much like hers; no surprises here. She noses around a little bit anyway, though only on a superficial level. She doesn't need to pry into anyone's life, she thinks, hypocritically. The other bedrooms get checked through with merely a nudge on the door to reveal their emptiness before she moves on. Jesse is last. And then she stares in disgust. What a... what a man room. And it's full of all this horrific crap.

At least he's not dead. She considers just leaving, and then doesn't. Cats over his layers of crap to crouch down by his bed and inspect.

Oh my God, is that a needle in him? She squints. That's a needle in him. Jesse, you are literally disgusting. Disgusting enough that she doesn't waffle much before reaching out, pinching the needle and pulling it out of his arm. Blood wells up from the puncture but she's not touching that.]

[The ache of needle leaving his arm makes him shift around a little, but he doesn't open his eyes. He mumbles a few incoherent words, still asleep.]

[If you're going to be like that, Jesse, she'll snoop around looking for his communicator and open it when she gets it.

Not for a total invasion of privacy. Just deleting some of the messages she sent him, which doesn't count as an invasion of privacy at all, right? He doesn't need to know about the banana story. Or about those photos. She resists the urge to delete the whole chain, and she can't stop looking at the pile of empty hypoes as she does. This is bringing back bad memories, and it's disgusting besides.]

[His arm starts to bother him and he scratches at it a few times before rolling onto his side so there's less pressure on it. Something funny happens then. His eyes flit open and he stares straight at Rin, but it's like he doesn't see her. Or like he expected her to be there. His tongue is all heavy in his mouth when he talks:]

Izzat your dad?

[She jumps slightly, gaze jerking back to him. There's a moment where she's just watching his glazed eyes and slack face.

Rolling with it.]

No. What did you do to yourself?

Wha..?

[He blinks blearily, then apparently comes to, because his head gives a sudden jerk and he rubs at his eyes.]

Fuuuuck... Where am I?

[She puts the communicator down.]

You're in your room. I called you like five times.

I was sleeping.

[Like that's not obvious. He flops back against the pillow, huffs out a breath as he gathers up his strength, then rolls over to reach for his pipe.]

You sleep really hard. [A judgy glance around - more at the mess than the vices on display.]

You know, I don't really understand your thing, but is there an actual purpose to leaving those out? [Gesturing at the hypos.]

[He pauses to glance at the needles, then hisses another "fuck" under his breath.]

That's - Jesus, I'm sorry. I wanted to make sure I wouldn't run out.

[He puts the pipe back down and starts clearing the needles away, though he's doing a bit of a shaky job of it, given that his fingers are still numb.]

[This is intensely not comfortable. She waffles around a little and then reaches out and touches one of the needles with very obvious gingerness.]

What was in these?

[As out of it as he is, he can still sense her discomfort - or he's been trained, at least, to feel guilty about exposing non-users to this stuff. He glances at her and immediately lowers his head.]

It's, um, K. Tranquilizer. I was starting to get a little - I just needed to be brought down. So I could sleep. 'cause it was getting intense. Sorta needed to even out, you know?

[He grabs away the needle Rin's reaching for and sweeps it and the others under his bed.]

That's dangerous! I mean, isn't it? Shouldn't you toss those out?

Nah, it ain't dangerous. I mean, as long as you're on something soft when you're shooting up, 'cause you go out like a light in two seconds.

[He sits on the edge of the bed and reaches for the pipe again. He looks about ready to roll over and pass out, which is why he's packing another rock into the bowl.]

Sorry if I scared you.

[So weird. Rin watches all of this with unnerved interest: the needles, swept under the bed. The pipe. Bizarrely reminded of Hyakurin for an instant.]

No, I mean... shouldn't you toss the needles...

Huh? Ah, nah. I gotta recycle 'em. I'll fix 'em later.

[He picks up his lighter, then seems to remember his manners and looks back to Rin.]

Do you mind if I - Or, like, do you want to..?

No. [This is deeply perturbing to her, in actuality. But from the fixed expression on her face she kind of does want to watch.]

[He looks uncertain about that, but if she's saying she doesn't mind, he'll go with it. Smoking meth isn't like weed or even cigarettes. There's not really any smoke at all, nothing to breathe secondhand. There's not even a smell, since his product is so pure. When he heats the bowl, the crystal inside starts to vaporize, and it's the vapor he inhales.

It doesn't look pleasant. After he takes the hit, he clenches his jaw and grinds his teeth a little. When the rush passes, he sets the pipe aside and glances at Rin with eyes that are much more alert now - and a little ashamed.]

[She stares back quite baldly. Then his shame sinks in a little and she averts her eyes slightly in response. She doesn't need to watch that pain like it's under a microscope.]

Why do you do it? [Okay, she heard his rant before but she barely listened to it.]

[He returns the pipe and lighter to the floor, then rubs at his neck while he considers the question.]

Because, um... I want to? I mean, I dunno. I can kick it anytime I want. But I don't get the point in kicking. It's not like I got anything else going on.

What does it feel like?

It's like...

[He mimes a little, trying to explain it in a more scientific way than usual, so it doesn't sound like he's trying to push it on her. He ends up pressing his hands together into a V-shape, mimicking a zooming camera.]

...everything gets super sharp. Clear. And, like, interesting. Like it's in focus, HD resolution. And whatever you're doing, you get real into it and you got energy - like a lot of energy. Like I couldn't sleep for days while the zombie thing was going on, and that was the point. Like, stay up and make sure you don't die. So I took more than usual, right, and that's why I needed to tranq myself after. 'cause I needed to come down and rest.

[She can understand the appeal of that.]

I think they're cleaned out, you know. The zombies I mean.

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