taxonomites | Haunted Holo [visual, eventually] the heart asks pleasure first

Current Location: Cain residence, Central

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Haunted Holo [visual, eventually] the heart asks pleasure first

As far as Taxon life goes, monotonous and jarring, one after the other in never ending ups and downs, the past few months of relative calm have been a blessing. He ended the annual on an unexpected high - confident in himself at long last, self assured and brimming with affirmation and all the supportive words he'd told himself he could go without. He had friendship (and the best kind, too), he had love (which was familiar in all the important ways, and constantly surprising in ways he doesn't know matter until they pop up). It's still true now that the annual had moved into its second quarter. Friends die, they come back. It's a chilling thought that he might become so jaded that the death of a friend doesn't hurt him any more, but the wave of relief that crashed over him when Long re-Arrived tells him he isn't so far gone. Yet. He has yet to take the people he cares about for granted.

When he wakes to the smell of coffee that's the sentiment that lingers in the air. He lifts his head from the pillow, wondering silently to himself when (and how) Paul got access to his place, because these random bouts of cooking need to stop. Of course he doesn't mean a single word, but he's never had a sunny disposition this early in the a.m. Coffee will make it better. Coffee, and a kiss, and...

He sniffs. Is that...?

No. No, he did not--

He gets up, pulling on the loose fitting t-shirt he sometimes sleeps in. Usually he wouldn't care about pants, but there's a chill in the air despite the warm smells wafting from the kitchen. Drawstring pants will do. Yes, coffee and a kiss will do the trick just fine.

But it isn't Paul by the kitchen counter, his dark blond hair a halo around his head thanks to the early morning sun. It isn't Paul's voice humming a tune Wyatt knows better than the back of his own hand. There's no nicotine in the air, no ringlets of smoke dancing their way up from the embers of a freshly lit cigarette. It isn't Paul.

Wyatt sags against the doorpost, heart pounding in his chest. "Adora?"

His wife turns around, guided by her chin rather than her eyes. When she looks up and their eyes meet, she smiles, and some last little crater in his heart fills up. She's older than he remembers her, but her eyes are bright and full of love, and there's flour on her cheek.

"Wyatt," she replies, ducking her head with a small chuckle and wipes her hands on her apron. "Oh, Wyatt, look at you." She comes to him, framing his face with both hands and kissing his cheek and he thinks his heart will burst from the pressure building in his chest. "It's okay, love," she tells him. "I'm here."

Somewhere towards the end of a lengthy talk and slow breakfast of freshly baked bread and coffee like he remembers it from home, Cain's tablet blips on in the bedroom. From its vantage point on the bedside table, the view isn't all that informative or inspiring, but the conversation carries through in muted tones of sometimes awkward happiness. It's been so long, and so much has happened for both of them, and they need to figure things out, like how to fit their lives into this new setting. He tells her he doesn't expect her to like the way he's trying to shape his new life, that it needs to take time for both of them. And of course there's Paul, and she just has to meet him, but later. Of course later.

Then footsteps, as one of them moves to the other side of the room. The soft click of a door opening... Then silence for the moment where everything shatters.

The noise that follows isn't merely a scream, but the sound of a man losing what he's already lost twice, and breaking apart.

Over the sound of screaming, Adora's voice comes from just outside the bedroom door as she closes the door over. "Did you really think I didn't know, Wyatt? After everything we had, everything I did for you... I couldn't let you get away with it. But now we can be happy again. Start over. Can't we, Wyatt?"

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As it turns out Glitch can sleep anywhere, including curled up under the crumbling porch of a (tornado-damaged) farmhouse. Also he can sleep through nearly anything when he has to, including footsteps pacing relentlessly above and his own voice cheerfully reminiscing about other holes he'd hidden in. Speculating about his nightmares. Pecking like a malevolent crow at his self and his confidence.

That he could drown out with solving formulas in his head until sleep came. The scream, on the other hand...

He awakes with a shout of his own, kicking and flailing, cracking his still-sore head on the mercifully silent floorboards. Whimpering he clutches his head, metal teeth and springy curls and sticky, spreading warmth and his gaze focuses on the tablet to distract from--

"What." Glitch has no idea what he's seeing and only the vaguest idea of what he's hearing, but there's one thing he's sure of. He snatches up the tablet and starts to crawl out from under the porch, bloody fingers hitting buttons for voice and map.

"Cain, Cain! LISTEN TO ME! It's not! Real!" He emerges into the fake sun and picks himself up from the fake dirt, ignores his very real pain to head for the genuine terror. "Whatever's happening is a lie, just get away!"

He'll be reiterating this point at length as he makes haste to his friend's dot, only slightly concerned that they may not be on the same plane.

Edited 2012-03-06 16:55 (UTC)

The only response Glitch gets are the noises coming from the other room - the keening wails not quite drowning out the chillingly calm, reasonable tones of what's posing as Cain's late wife.

She's trying to reason with him, but there's no response; not at first, then, the grief morphing into blinding rage. Wyatt roars behind the closed door. There's the sound of movement, of feet sliding over the floor, glass breaking. More shouts from both of them, the unmistakable sound of wood splintering under the weight of a grown man.

Then nothing.

Nothing.

Glitch is maybe half listening and only slightly processing, much more focused on closing the distance since trying to build any sort of context just expands the yawning dread consuming him. He knew his crooned reasurances were for himself alone as the shattered nightmare of Old Taxon gave way to familiar and eerily silent Central streets and--

The sudden crescendo and then silence from the tablet staggers him for a moment, then he makes distressed noise and goes faster. Blocks vanish, and then there's a green door and steps taken two, three (trip, fall, recover) at a time, then palm open another door, gasping.

Blood, cordite, and chaos. Glitch absorbs the details, folds them up, files them, lets his quivering legs carry him to the form huddled in the corner and then drops to his knees. He can't catch his breath, wouldn't have words to say even if he did, so he waits, glancing from Cain to the foot poking out from in front of the sofa and back.

"...not real," he rasps indistinctly and wipes at the trickle of blood on his brow. Superficial, had to be. "Not...real."

Gone are the shutters, the walls crumbled, the gatekeeper dead and buried; Cain's face are no longer a diagram of angles and straight lines, but wobbly and quivering like strings too close to snapping. His breaths come in laboured gasps of air, the blood spatters on his face washed from his cheeks by tears. When he looks up at Glitch, his eyes are vacant, glossed over.

"She-- Jeb, he's--" His face twists in despair. "My boy, she..."

The only thing Glitch can do in response to that is clamber closer and touch, and then put his arms around Cain and pulls him tight against him. His own heart is still hammering as the adrenaline slowly, slowly ebbs and he glances back to the foot.

No. No no no. He closes his eyes tight and presses his face against his friend's hair.

"They've done this, Wyatt," he whispers. "They did this and it's a lie. I I promise i-it's not real. It's not."

Wyatt clings, his knuckles white as he holds on to the back of Glitch's clothes, bunching fabric like twin sets of claws. He can't escape the pain, but there's something to be said about having someone's arms around you when you need it the most. For a while, he can't form sentences, or words that make sense; hiding his face in the borderland between Glitch's neck and chest and just trying to breathe through the stuttered sobs.

It hurts. It's never hurt like this before.

"She..." he tries it one more time, needing to explain the fact he's shot his long lost wife in the head (two times) and the chest (once) and the knee (as he stumbled backwards, losing his aim).

"I don't care if it's not real, she-- She hurt him, she, she said it was my own fault for straying, she had a knife--"

And a rolling pin, which could easily have crushed his larynx in one blow, but she lost her balance before it made contact. He'll be bruised, but at least he can still talk. He can breathe, even if it hurts.

Already his mind is beginning to shut away the pain and confusion and the anger, so much anger, so much despair it's like gazing into a black hole and considering the plunge.

With a murmur Glitch does what he can to sooth, rubbing small circles on Cain's back and listening. And when the words stopped and the world filled with silence he pressed back against it.

"I spoke with the queen yesterday," he began quietly. Distraction and unburdening. "She called me the worst sort of deviant for what I've done with her daughter, said I deserved the thing on my head, r-renounced me. Flung me right off the terrace...the fall was further than I think I remember."

All nothing, really, compared to what Cain had been through but a sure enough demonstration of how everything was being twisted, their worst nightmares and perceived failings getting amplified. The scenarios were false, but the anguish was inescapable.

Doesn't matter that it doesn't compare; it would seem everyone's worst nightmare has come to haunt Taxon. A nightmare's a nightmare. There's no such thing as worse when it's all so bad it's rotten to the core.

He heaves a shaking sigh, squeezing Glitch close and tight and grounding, though he can't tell who needs it the most.

"As long as you're okay..." He leans back, forces his cramping fingers to let go slowly. His eyes dart here and there, everywhere but beyond the couch or towards the bathroom.

"I should... I should probably clean up. Myself...clothes, I--" That's rational, isn't it? That's the sane thing to do, right?

...right?

"I'm here and I'm staying," Glitch replies, which he believes is answer enough for his status. The little shurg, stillborn smile, and fresh blood on his brow fill in the any blanks.

He peers at Cain, hoping to maintain the connection for both their sake's. A lifeboat was a lifeboat, even if it leaked and the oar was broken, it was a way to keep going in the flood.

"You should," he says, careful and encouraging. "That's a good idea. And I'm staying." It probably bore repeating, that he wasn't goign to be alone.

"Okay," Wyatt says, the word barely more audible than a huff of air. "Okay." Maybe if he says the word enough times it will magic away all the horrors. Maybe it will undo it all. It's okay. It will be okay, he's okay, he's fine.

Slowly, with a bit of help, he pushes up off the floor. His knees shake, his hands tremble. He thinks he could be sick (again), but there's no food in his stomach. The nausea is a dull ache that fades a little bit for every deep breath he takes.

"I should--" He makes a vague gesture to the bedroom, moving there as if through a daze. He'll just get some clean clothes. He'll feel better if he just changes clothes.

DG heard the noise - far worse than a scream and truly heart breaking - across the tablet before she caught sight of what had inspired it. It cut through to her core. She couldn't see the ghost that was speaking and she didn't recognise the voice, but it wasn't difficult to guess who it was supposed to be.

"Cain!"

She couldn't get to him. She couldn't get to him.

"Cain?"

The sounds of a struggle come through the bedroom door in sharp, sudden staccato pulses - the creak of something heavy sliding after a forceful impact, slaps of bare skin on the floor, all muted.

Then, as the noises build to a crescendo of violence, three loud bangs.

After that, after a few long moments of too crisp silence, someone sliding down against a wall.

There's no conscious response from Cain. He's started sobbing again. It might be too little in the way of consolation for his friends, but at least he's alive. The bedroom door stays shut.

Cain's on his way out the front door of his building, looking a lot like he was just part of a massacre; blood spatters and smears caked into his skin and hair, smudged where he's wiped away tears. It's a stark contrast to his usual choice of clothing: his coat, the old brown one from home, and peeking out from under it a crisp pale blue shirt...and a black vest-like garment with no visible buttons.

"DG, are you okay? I'm fine. Glitch is here, we're both fine."

If he just says that enough times, maybe he can convince himself it's true. Maybe if he talks enough he'll get his voice back to what it normally sounds like.

"It's just a malfunction, but it's dangerous, kiddo. Real bad news."

Waiting for a response had been horrible, but there had been nothing else for her to do. She couldn't get to him, despite her best efforts, her magic and her steely determination. All she could do was hope.

"Am I ok?" DG almost laughed at that. He was alive but he was still a mess and she couldn't believe that was the first question to leave his lips. "I'm fine, Cain. Are you sure you're ok?"

Because he didn't look it. And, from what she'd seen on the tablets, the malfunction was one of the worst that they'd ever seen.

For a moment, just a heartbeat or two, Cain averts his eyes, swallowing tightly. "Ask me later. Not now." Then, looking straight at his friend, allowing some hint of worry to show through.

"Paul's in trouble. We're going to get him." There. He said it. "Can't risk talking over the tablet, so you won't hear from us until we're done. Soon as we're clear, we'll get back to you, okay?"

Although DG didn't like the sound of that, and although she wished she could have been there beside them, DG had no choice but to nod. She every intention to trying to talk to him about this when it was over, but, for now, Paul was in trouble and that had to take priority. She was hardly surprised to see that Cain was putting someone else first.

"Fine. Be careful. I'll keep trying to get to you, but I don't know what's going to happen."

Even if she did manage to get into the other city, there was no guarantee that she'd be able to find her friends.

"No!"

The sudden bark comes as a surprise even to himself, and he flinches visibly once he realizes his mistake. "No, Deej, please," he insists, his eyes growing a touch too bright. For a moment the screen falls on the sky above, showing glimpses of the building and Glitch in the background as Cain smashes the passenger seat window with a crowbar. There's the click of a lock sliding open, the passenger seat opened, the flash of interior as Cain reaches over to unlock the driver's seat.

"You have to stay safe. If it gets you, it gets you, but you don't go out of your way to make it happen. Are we clear?"

He isn't sure he could stay in one piece, mentally or emotionally, if he had one more friend to worry about. It was bad enough that he had to live through it, that two of his closest friends were stuck right there with him, but the one sole comfort he had was knowing DG was safe.

As safe as you could be in Taxon, at the very least.

Her expression hardened at the exclamation - the order - and, although he corrected himself a moment later, it didn't return to normal immediately.

"If I was stuck there and you were on the other side, you wouldn't just sit and wait," she pointed out. "I'm not going to do anything stupid, but I need to do something."

"If you were stuck here and I wasn't, would you want me to be? Would you want Glitch here? Do you?"

He shakes his head, going around to the driver's seat, gets in and starts using blunt force to get to the wires underneath the panel. If it's anything like the cars he's familiar with, it won't take much to get it going.

Spending a few nights in jail is a small price to pay for getting caught in the act of stealing a vehicle.

"Just stay safe. You just need to stay safe. I'll contact you once...once we're done." Not over, done. Once they're done.

"Cain out," he says finally, giving his friend a small, brave smile that only gets halfway to reassuring, then turns his tablet off. Radio silence means radio silence, and there's no time to waste on weighing arguments. Not when Paul's life is on the line.

"No, but what we want doesn't matter much here."

He'd made a good point, but she wouldn't be swayed so easily. She'd always fight beside her friends. That was what friends were for.

She returned the smile as best she could, then watched the blank tablet screen for a moment longer before continuing her ultimately vain attempts to reach them on the other side.

Cain's dot has been stationary for a while now, only moving here and there as necessity called for it. When he contacts DG again, he's cleaned up, had a bit of a personal breakdown time in the men's room, cleaned up again, and spent a while slumped in a chair by Paul's bedside.

He's in the clear. They're in the clear, and Cain promised to contact DG as soon as he could.

He figures the added time it took him to calm down is allowed for. She's already worried enough, she doesn't need to watch him crack open like an egg (or a skull) again. Once is enough.

"...hey, Deej," he murmurs, eyes on the screen and tablet held between his two hands. Everything aches, but it's as much the adrenaline finally fading away as it's from any lingering injuries.

"We made it."

DG exhaled in palpable relief. She'd ended up in the workshop after her conversation with Cain and was sitting on the floor with her legs crossed, surrounded by Glitch's notes and unfinished machinery.

"Where are you now?" she asked. She knew that there was still no way for her to get to him, but knowing how long they would be safe for was something, at least.

They are looking for him and any sound is a danger, a risk, could lead them right to him. Paul knows this. But he has to try and reach Cain, because goddammit he needs help, they fucking shot him and he needs someone in his corner and Wyatt's the one he trusts in this fucked up city.

Paul turns the tablet's volume low as it will go with one hand, his other keeping the pressure on his side. His lungs are on fire, every breath hurts. He knows another bullet grazed his arm but it's his side that's the real trouble, the fabric of his shirt matted with blood.

Maybe he should text Wyatt. It'll be slow one-handed, but...

Before he can decide, he's getting the transmission from Wyatt's tablet. The sounds. The noises.

Paul listens. There's nothing else he can do. He holds his side and puts his forehead against his knee and listens to the soft, awful noises, the tablet whispering away at minimal volume.

When it's over he lifts his head. His eyes feel dry, itchy. He presses the button to respond.

"Wyatt," he says, his own voice a strained rasp. He can't talk too loud, he can't. They're looking for him, and the walls of the building he's holed up in are thin.

"Wyatt. Goddamnit, Wyatt. Talk to me if you can hear me."

A few minutes later, an eternity under the circumstances, Glitch arrives at the scene of the crime. There's the muted tones of desperation, of consolation, and for a few precious moments Cain doesn't have to be strong.

The bedroom door slowly glides open, Wyatt moving through it like something out of a horror movie from the eighties; but the blood soaked into his clothes, covering his arms aren't bright tomato red, but a muted, dark red fading into brown coagulation.

He registers the tablet blinking as if through a fog. Recognition sparks as his mind centers on the here and now. He picks it up, visibly pushing the past fifteen minutes to the very back of his mind. There's more important things to focus on, less painful, sickening things.

"Paul?" His voice is weak, cracked from recent abuse. "Paul, are you there?"

There's no answer, and Paul closes his eyes and concentrates on his breathing and keeping the pressure on his side. Wyatt's not answering so either he can't hear him or he's.... unable to answer. Emotionally, physically, whatever.

Wyatt's not-the-fuck-okay. Wyatt is not okay, Wyatt needs help, but Paul's blocks and blocks away and he can't breathe without lancing fire and he needs help himself.

They all need help, every last poor sorry asshole of them stuck in this city, and the list of the walking wounded is just getting longer.

On the other side of the wall there are footsteps, the easy tread. One of the brothers. Paul holds his breath. He's left a blood trail, he knows it.

He has to move.

Paul scoops up the tablet, carefully, and eases himself to his feet, holding his breath until he's vertical. Can't hold tablet and gun and his side at the same time so he merges the tablet to the bracelet, blood smeared and smudged over them both.

Gun. Careful. Quiet. Room to room, pausing after every step to listen and here where they are.

He shot Murphy. He doesn't know if he killed him. He doesn't know how bad it was. Maybe three are hunting him, maybe two.

The building is a deserted hotel, room after room of nobody here, windows boarded over. Paul's sure he's never seen it in Taxon before but he can't question its appearance right now.

Paul makes it down a hallway into a janitorial closet before he has to stop. He eases the door shut after him and sinks down in the corner, his breathing shallow.

When the tablet jerks to life on his wrist he nearly pulls the gun's trigger, his nerves keyed far too tight.

"...fuck," he exhales instead. "I'm here. Wyatt--"

What the hell does he say? Are you alright? Bullshit.

"I'm sorry," Paul whispers thickly, and leans his head back against the closet wall. "I'm sorry for what they just did to you."

By 'they' he means the aliens.

There's barely any light where Paul is, but Wyatt can tell that it's a small space from the sound of his voice alone. Acoustics make for a fine thing to focus on while the majority of your conscious mind just wants to scream until you can't physically make a sound.

But he's already done that, and he can't undo it just to have a fresh go. Paul's face is obscured, but he can hear the tension in his voice, the raspiness of it that isn't usually there, some new dimension added to it.

"No," he says, shaking his head in a lingering daze. Voice softening, "Don't be. ...it's just another malfunction. Are you--?" He's almost afraid to ask.

No, strike that. He's terrified. "Are you okay?"

"gimme a second," Paul grunts. Gun. Gun has to be set down, hand shifted to tablet, wrenching it back out of the wrist interface, back to normal size.

The glow from the screen seems terribly bright in the dimness of the closet and for a second he has a panicked thought that they'll see the light under the closet's door. No, no, that's not rational, it's much brighter in the hall, flickering fluorescent ceiling lights and all, they won't pick up the glow from beneath the door as any different.

The screen's back: he can see Wyatt. He sucks in a reflexive breath at the metric fuckton of blood the other man has on him, and then winces at what that does to his side.

Keep the pressure on the wound. Paul licks at his dry lips.

"Been better. I was gonna ask if you're free but..."

It must be the bloodloss making him dizzy, making him think laughter's the appropriate response here, but he laughs all the same, a short, hoarse little chuckle.

"But looks like you've got your own personal nightmare to fuck you over. You should take a shower, Wyatt."

The adrenaline rush that got him into the building and away from Them is starting to fade. He feels dull and hollow in its wake, cold, and tired. Maybe just let them kill him. Why the fuck not, Taxon will just bring him back. Right?

Wyatt doesn't draw his breath at the sight of the other man. The line of his jaw tightens, his eyebrows lowering. Paul's hurt. That takes precedent over this...this...this.

"I'm coming to get you," he says firmly, dismissing the thought of changing clothes or cleaning up. There's no time for that.

"What's your status? Any hostiles near your location?"

Paul's silent for several seconds, the light of the tablet casting a dull glow over the sharp features of his face, a scrape on his jaw.

Somebody more heroic than Paul Smecker might say, no, don't come, it's too dangerous, I'll manage. Paul is not a goddamn hero. Paul's an FBI agent, or he was a lifetime ago, and self-sacrificing stupidity has never been his thing. Martyrdom has never been his thing.

He leaves that shit to the Saints.

The ones hunting him now.

He closes his eyes, briefly, tries to mentally shut that down. Intellectually he knows it's not really them any more than Wyatt's wife was really her. It's a glitch. He knows that. Has to keep reminding himself of it.

"Keep in mind the tablets are fucking up," he says in that strained whisper, because he still needs to watch his volume. "I'm in a boarded-up hotel, name said Hyperion. Two, possibly three hostiles-- one older man, bearded, two younger men, dark coats, tattoos."

His tone is all business. They're just like any other criminal.

"They're very good with their guns, Wyatt, don't get yourself the fuck shot coming to be my personal John Wayne, alright?"

Paul licks his lips again. "I'm shot. One superficial, one in the side. It didn't hit anything important or I wouldn't still be conscious."

"Clear through or lodged?"

He gets up, bringing the tablet with him, going to the hatch in the kitchen to get what he needs, because he can't go into the bathroom for the medikit, he just can't. Glitch hovers in the background. Gauze, ointment, surgical tape... Lots and lots of ammo, just to indulge the boyscout syndrome.

He knows he should be feeling something other than the strict professional calm that now covers him like a warm blanket. He should be horrified for Paul's sake. He should be worried (and he is, he just can't feel it), and all sorts of emotions he can't put names to because they're too far out of reach. There's no contingency plan for this.

"Radio silence is active the moment I walk out the door. I'll find you. Can you walk at all?"

"Lodged," Paul answers with a little grunt. "I've got pressure on it but, you know, hard to manage that and move too. I... can walk."

He hopes that still holds true by the time Wyatt finds him. He doesn't know how much blood he's lost but he knows it's more than his body ought.

"...they're very good, Wyatt," he says again, because he doesn't know how else to say it, how else to say be careful, how else to say They scare me, Wyatt, these men scare me. "Don't get into a shootout."

Cain nods, quiet for a moment as he adds another item he needs to his to-do list: antibiotics. It will have to be after, because right now he doesn't want to waste any more time. He'll need to clean Glitch's head injury, make sure he's okay, because he's not leaving him behind (in here).

Unbidden but not unwanted, memories of one year ago come to the forefront of his mind. The frustration, dulled down by fever, knowing that Paul was holed up in his place above the shop and he couldn't get to him. Somewhere in the distance, he can hear the strings strumming out the thin fragments of music he'll never forget.

"I know," he says softly, warmly despite the chill. He wants to reach out so bad his fingers ache. "I promise I'll be careful. You just keep pressure on the wound, okay?"

"Hatch a bulletproof vest. And ammo. I'm out," is Paul's answer, again with the faint tinge of inappropriate humor. He closes his eyes.

Hey, if I'm gone already by the time you get here--

Hey, if I don't make it--

Look, if they kill me--

No, fuck it. He's not going to say shit. Cain's gonna come get him. On a fucking horse, Paul's mind supplies. Wild wild west, cowboys and sinners and saints.

Yeah. Yeah. That's a nice image.

He shifts his grip, the tablet's view wobbling a little, sliding until it's no longer directly focused on his face. His other hand sliding to keep the pressure on. He wishes he could tell if the bleeding's stopped yet. Breathing still really hurts.

"See you soon, cowboy," he whispers.

Inappropriate or not, it crinkles the skin around Cain's eyes; the back of his mind supplying he must look like one of the criminally insane.

"I'm on it. You'll owe me dinner for this, agent."

It's a bad joke, not even a real one, but it touches on something more familiar, less teetering on the sharp edge of a blade.

If you're dead when I get there I will kill you, he doesn't say. Couldn't say it if he tried, because he can just make out the glint of a knife in the corner of his eye. Over there. On the floor. By his wife's... He closes his eyes, squeezes them shut until pin pricks of light float before him in a sea of darkness.

"Cain out."

"So what's our plan?"

Diplomacy demands discretion, the need to know compels him to listen in, worry insists he stay vigilant (and so he stands guard by the sofa, hoping to direct attention up), and loyalty negates any question of if he's coming along.

Glitch holds a cloth to the top of his head, a couple inches right of the zipper. He'd caught the corner of a framing beam, and while it wasn't serious the bleeding remained stubborn. As it is the injury is pretty much the least of his concerns.

Cain ducks his head, jaw protruding as he works it back and forth. He's a hair's breadth from grinding his teeth to dust from the escalated tension, but he can't let it get to him. He has to keep it under lock and key, needs to focus.

"We're getting patched up," he says, all business. "I'm getting dressed. We gear up, we secure a suitable vehicle. In, out, no unnecessary risks."

It's only now that he looks up, bright blue eyes searching Glitch's dark brown pair. "I'm not as fast as I used to be."

He nods, accepting that. They'd executed flimsier plans - steal longcoat uniforms, sneak into the tower, sneak out again with the world's most valuable prisoner - and this would be...well. It'll be whatever it will be. Don't die remained the unspoken main objective.

"I think I'm faster," Glitch says with a little shrug. Healthier living and regular training will do that. "So that'll make up for...something."

Gingerly he removes the folded cloth from his head and scowls. "Stupid thing..."

"It's okay," Cain tells his friend in the shadowlands of reassurance.

"Let's see what we can do about that."

[ooc: ftb, get going with the other threads?]

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Haunted Holo [visual, eventually] the heart asks pleasure first

[voice] i put some tl in your dr so you can dr while you tl

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[ location ] cut to the other thread here Y/N?

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