Val and Jack: Event: Rhymes
Val goes into Jack's workshop, starts to say something, then gets a funny look on his face and goes back out again.
Five minutes later he's back, having extensively rehearsed this. His mental vocabulary is still larger than the bank of words he knows and can say aloud without unintelligible blurring, so this latest Margate warpedness is intolerable.
"You should be crying," he tells Jack.
Jack looks up from the tiny screw he's fiddling with, expecting that he's taken overlong to notice the latest prank -- stolen mail, laundry soap in the coffee, the usual tricks. "What have you done?"
"'m dying."
"That's not fun," Jack says, not terribly impressed by his melodrama.
Val sulks over to a low stool in the corner, which Jack uses primarily to reach the neighbor's light fixtures. He drops onto it. "I hurt."
"That'll teach you to get in fights with any more birds." The resulting beak and claw injuries when Val tried to attack a large seagull (he claimed it was looking at him funny) are fresh in Jack's imagination.
"Phbbbbt," says Val, which he doesn't seem to need to rhyme, and then appears to get lost for a while.
"Run out of words?" Jack asks, not without sympathy.
"Flirt," Val decides at last, exasperated, to finish the couplet, then launches into, "Think I'm sick. Help me quick."
"What doesn't feel well?" Jack sets down the screwdriver and comes over to lay the back of his hand on Val's small brow, and is startled and concerned to find him burning up, his turquoise hair damp. "Let's go see Zel."
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"He's gonna kill me!" Val wails. "Then Gaav-sama will kill you! Plea ... se! This won't do!"
"Doctors don't kill people, kid. I never heard of one who did."
"They'll cut me up and stick machines in me! Dora said! I have to flee!" He's getting creative in the moment's necessity. Jack reflects that this is probably actually good for him.
"I don't know where she got that idea. Now come here." If Jack's parents hadn't been from the Midwest, he couldn't have gotten away with that one.
"No! Won't go!"
"Get out from under that bed before you hit your head."
"Gonna live with the dust until I rust!"
"If you die of flu I'll have Zel resurrect you so I can kill you."
"Leave me alone to die! Unless ... there's pie."
"I'll make you pie. Val, don't cry."
"Not trying to. Leave me alone, I don't like you."
"You said you liked me three days ago. You have an appointment, we need to go."
"NO! Won't go."
"Gaav's not gonna be happy if you're at death's door. They'll give you some medicine and cool you down some more."
"Won't go! No!"
"Either go to the doctor in town, or I'm putting you in a cold bath to cool you down."
Val ceased to claw at the carpet under his furniture and flipped over to look up at Jack with big, scared yellow eyes. "No cold," he appeals. "I'll ... mold."
"That didn't even make sense. Come on, let's get you dressed."
Val flops over his arm. "Dying."
"Stop crying."
"'M not. It's snot."
Jack grimaces and finds him a tissue. He pulls Val gently to his chest, settling him against his shirt. "The doctor'll make you feel right again. And Gaav won't beat me to a pulp then."
"Like to see that," Val grumbles, then looks up with eyes even huger. "My rat!"
"Don't worry, he'll be fine. We won't be gone for a long time."
"Can rats get swine flu? Why am I asking you," he mutters, his head thudding against Jack's chest.
"You do not have the swine flu. No more news radio in front of you."
"Dyyyying," Val repeats. "Dyyyying."
And continues to repeat it until Jack is inches from helping him get there.
This needed to happen as dialogue, I'm afraid, so there you have it.