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Jimmy Proudstar ([info]little_jim) wrote in [info]devolve,
@ 2011-01-24 00:18:00

Previous Entry  Add to memories!  Tell a Friend!  Next Entry
Entry tags:alisa_tager, jimmy_proudstar

Who: Jimmy and Alisa
What: Finishing his after-run rounds of the colony
Where: Library
When: Backdated Late Saturday January 22nd
Rating: PG
Status: Incomplete

Every time Jimmy came back from a run, once he'd scrubbed down and been checked over, was move through the colony until he could account for every member.

Some were easier than others. Dr. McCoy was almost always in the medical lab, Stark was nearly always in his own laboratory. A quick detour down in the sub basement confirmed this. This late in the day, most people were inside. Jimmy had seen a few when he came in, a quick round of the mansion's upper floor confirmed nearly everyone else.

Except one. Alisa Tager or Cipher. Who had the ability to turn completely invisible. Inaudible as well. Even Lorna said she couldn't sense her with her powers and she seemed to be able to sense everything from his understanding.

Jimmy could track her by smell. Which was how he'd tracked her down after a run since she'd been there. He didn't know much about her, not like everyone else. She spent most of her time invisible, which meant all he really knew about her was how she smelled. He didn't bother her, since she wouldn't be invisible if she wanted to be noticed. At least by his reasoning.

But he searched her out like everyone else after every run. Because he had to know they were all still there. All still alive. Or he'd never be able to sleep, get any rest at all.

He finally tracked her down in the library. Alisa had been all over the main compound common areas, but here her scent was the strongest and most consistent. Jimmy stepped into the room to confirm it, tracking until he could figure out where she was. Then he turned to leave.


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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-25 05:39 am UTC (link)
Alisa was the same way - only her excuse was that she wanted to be useful, somehow. And part of that translated into kind of spying on the populous, making sure everything was hunky-dory in compound land. Not many knew she did it. Likely no one actually. She was stealth girl after all.

What was normalcy anyway? Beyond a conversation anyhow. Her life couldn't have been exactly described as normal but it certainly wasn't dramatic until the virus... She didn't want to think about that.

Coming out of her shell was difficult for her. She felt safe when she was invisible. No one expected anything of her then because no one could find her and... He couldn't find her. Even if some how he just showed up on the compound, she would be safe. It was a paranoid precaution though she used it less and less. As for friends or attachments... Well. Hard to trust a girl who's always invisible. Who knew what she was actually doing, right?

"I don't like her dashes. Really, it's kind of annoying. What is that supposed to even mean anyway?" She'd never gotten to Emily in high school. She'd been fifteen when... Yeah.

"Ugh, I hate raiders," she said emphatically, "Acting like they own the world. It would be so much better if we all worked together instead of forming... I don't know, tribes really." And then she realized who she was talking to and her eyes went a little wide and she looked down at the carpet, mumbling, "Sorry, no offense... I was thinking of an old TV show."

Alisa looked back up, surprised by his question - he actually wanted to know something about her? Suddenly her Mysterious Nature was wearing off! "Um... Everything I can get really. Study habits are hard to break even when -" she broke off suddenly, sighing a little, "When you don't have your parents breathing down your neck..."

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[info]little_jim
2011-01-25 10:03 am UTC (link)
Jimmy did more unintentional spying on the populace than he wanted to. Once again, he just assumed she was insular and perhaps even feeling penned in as he did. He'd never thought to question it.

Everyone's life stopped being normal when the virus hit. And none of them really wanted to think about it.

He doubted anyone suspected Alisa of doing anything bad. Really, why would she betray who was protecting her? Something she just confirmed when she expressed her dislike of the raiders.

"I know what you mean," Jimmy told her, shaking his head at her apology. "It would be better if we did work together instead of forming our own 'tribes'. But it's human nature for like minded people to band together for survival." He shrugged. "They have learned not to mess with us for the most part. The ones who do, don't make the same mistake twice."

It was something else he didn't want to talk about really.

Jimmy suddenly became how young and alone Alisa was. "I'll bet," he admitted, crouching down so she didn't have to strain her neck to look in his eyes from where she was sitting. Some of the chairs in the compound could bear his weight, but most of them were far too small for comfort "It's been awhile since I've taken time to read. I try to keep busy..." Resting his elbows on his knees, he looked at her. "I like stories, so I do like books."

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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-25 01:29 pm UTC (link)
Well at least he wasn't offended. There was a little piece of her that thought she was an idiot about still caring but she had been raised better than that. Better than her own stereotype. Better than getting pissed when she couldn't get a cab or someone called her a name. "Isn't it like minded enough to just want to survive," she asked but mostly to herself. She huffed a sigh out of the corner of her mouth, not looking at him for a moment both to have a moment and to give her neck a rest.

Alisa looked back to Jimmy as he crouched down. Oh thank god for that. "Maybe once its spring again you can take a little more time for it. I personally might start ferreting a few things to safe, dry places outside for reading." It was so much nicer to read outside but to do so in the winter was asking for frostbite.

She smiled faintly, chuckling, "I like stories that don't really end. Like there aren't any more pages but you still... don't exactly know what happened to everyone. Not many authors risk it." Alisa tucked her hair behind her ear, shrugging, "Those ones usually don't leave you with a sense of hope though."

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[info]little_jim
2011-01-25 04:40 pm UTC (link)
It would be a silly thing to be offended about. She hadn't insulted any tribe, just used the term collectively. And it was an accurate description of the way the survivors had divided themselves. In truth, Jimmy considered the colony his tribe, his family, now. Since they were all he had left.

"I wish it was," Jimmy admitted solemnly. "But the raiders want to do so at any cost, which includes at the expense of others or even each other." That time they'd found the dead, stripped raider amongst the victims was extremely telling.

He would probably end up sitting on the floor if the conversation lasted much longer. Just to get more comfortable. "Or I can actually come inside to read," he pointed out. "I've never gotten used to New England winters. I'd never seen snow except in the distance on the mountains before I came to school here. It wasn't as great as I expected." Jimmy gave Alisa a brief, wry smile.

Yes, Warpath had a sense of humor. It didn't rear it's head often, but it was there.

"Stories that don't end, huh?" he prompted. "That's about the only kind I know. Legends of how fire was created, and the Spirits and their adventures. Most of those leave lots of hope. After all, they're all supposed to be lessons. Not all lessons have to have grim endings."

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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-27 04:36 am UTC (link)
Well still... Her mother would have been upset with her. Or something. Even though she was long since dead, Alisa worried constantly what her mother would think of her now.

She shuddered a little. Alisa couldn't imagine living in that sort of uncertainty like the raiders. Anyone could turn on you at any time. Living in the compound was a huge relief really even if the world around her was still terribly uncertain.

"True but spring is a much nicer season for reading. Warming air, clean breezes, flowers and bees buzzing around. Everything's in bloom," of course, she didn't need to tell Jimmy any of this. He knew what spring was like but... still. It just seemed nicer to have a book out in that sort of weather instead of trapped, stifled inside. "I've lived here all my life. Still hate the snow so you're not alone," she smiled though it was a tiny bit flat.

"And not all stories have lessons," she countered softly, "There's this one book I read... Awhile ago. It was complicated and I was a little young for it. House of Leaves. There are about three stories in it. Well, a lot more but three main ones. The Navidson report ends but we never find out what really killed Zampano or if Johnny imagined the marks on the floor. Nor do we get to know what happened to Johnny Truant or if absolutely everything was part of his paranoid schizophrenic breakdown." Alisa blushed a little, she was getting too detailed, too enthusiastic. Something.

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[info]little_jim
2011-01-27 06:40 am UTC (link)
He appreciated the sentiment. Jimmy worried constantly since his brother's death if he was living up to his memory. Now he was trying to be worthy of being the last Tinde warrior alive. It was a lot sometimes.

Jimmy couldn't either. He'd never known anything but being part of a group, even as insular as he was. First there was his tribe and family, then the school and his fellow students, many who became his teammates afterwords. Now, those that remained were all he had. Alisa had become one of their tribe when she joined them, whether she realized it or not.

"Spring is much nicer period," he agreed. "Especially here. Spring is my favorite season. Everything comes back to life and wakes up. The world is so alive in spring. Sometimes I wish I could show people how alive, since they can't see it like I do." Speaking of his heightened senses was something Jimmy didn't do very often. It was like trying to explain color to a blind man or what a sound was like to someone who couldn't hear. Plus he didn't want to make anyone uncomfortable.

"How do those not tell lessons?" he replied, raising his brows. "Needing to know what's real, see things for how they are, is an important lesson. And knowing that you don't always need to know everything to learn something. Some stories have smaller lessons inside them."

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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-27 07:19 am UTC (link)
Alisa wasn't so sure about the tribe thing but... Well, technically they had a name and an identifying mark. They just needed their own special language, didn't they?

She smiled, listening to him. It was kind of a treat really - he wasn't exactly this social with everyone so Alisa delighted in hearing him speak. His voice alone was something... special. "It can't be all good things having senses like that though, right? I mean, someone shines an LED light in your eyes or some rancid smell like thirty skunks." She had to think this way - tactics were kind of her thing.

Alisa settled back in her chair, almost glad for the argument. It meant he wasn't planning on going anywhere immediately. "But even then, it leaves out consequences for Johnny Truant beating the Hell out of some guy after the guy half-accidentally kills Johnny's best friend Lude. And what about some kind of positive note from Johnny getting off his sex, drugs and rock and roll lifestyle? Instead he turns into a filthy hobo and starts losing teeth..."

She laughed a little, "It's a very complicated book. Even just reading it is difficult. You have to turn it around and upside down and bounce between three sets of footnotes going back two hundred pages to find a reference..."

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[info]little_jim
2011-01-27 07:25 am UTC (link)
Pretty much all they needed was their own language.

Jimmy sighed and nodded. "It's had it's moments," he admitted. "I was really grateful when Kevin started disintegrating the bodies instead of us burning them. The smell was unbelievably sickening." That was probably not the most cheerful explanation. "But yes, the world can be overwhelming, especially inside where everything's condensed. That's part of the reason I spend so much time outside. And don't sleep in the mansion or the barracks. Too loud."

He listened to her explanation, then shrugged. "Maybe the author wanted you to decide for yourself what happened?" he suggested. "It sounds way too complicated. I like my stories simpler than that, sorry."

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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-27 07:46 am UTC (link)
Alisa wrinkled her nose. Why did he have to talk about the dead like that? Of course, a body was a body - the person was long gone but... It just wasn't right. This was a world of the Dead now. They ruled and required respect. If you didn't respect them, then you'd get killed a lot faster... Maybe that was just her. "Understandable. I can barely sleep here sometimes."

She ran a hand over her hair, shrugging her shoulders, "Probably. All of the author's books are complicated. Another of his, Only Revolutions, is two stories at once in abstract poetry. You have to read eight pages of one story, flip it over, read the next eight pages. All along with keeping up with the time-line in the margins."

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[info]little_jim
2011-01-27 07:51 am UTC (link)
Jimmy had more respect for the dead than she realized. Destroying them completely was the only respectful to do with the bodies. That way they couldn't be reanimated as the blasphemies of the zombies or worse, consumed by them. And he was just being honest about the smell. He'd learned to stay upwind on burn days after getting sick a few times.

"I don't sleep much, even by myself," he admitted. "Sometimes too quiet is worse than too noisy." Not that either of probably wanted to talk about that either.

That book sounded even more complicated, but interesting. Definitely a better topic than dead bodies or not being able to sleep. "What's that one about?" he asked.

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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-27 08:15 am UTC (link)
Well, yes. It was just. She couldn't explain it. Maybe it was watching her parents fall to the virus. Maybe it was driving through the hoards to escape, running a few bodies over with a car at the age of fifteen. Something. She didn't know. She felt guilty.

Alisa looked at the floor when she asked, "Sometimes they carry on the wind, don't they?" She assumed. She didn't have Jimmy's kind of hearing. But it sounded plausible enough.

She scoffed a little, "You know, I never figured that out. I put it down at one point and never picked it back up. I think it was like two god-like figures intertwined through time and space. I stopped reading around..."

She paused, trying to remember the exact line, "'I'm over this. O what dour, repugnant thing just rolled me? Hownow here? So easily misused? Flowers from my curls so rudely removed? Time to waste this fucker. No worries.'"

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[info]little_jim
2011-01-27 08:25 am UTC (link)
Jimmy never spoke about what he did when he found his tribe. Never wanted to. Not even to Ororo. He didn't like to remember that time. Even if he was still insular and distant, he'd come a long way from the wreck he'd been when he'd returned from Arizona.

They all had come a long way really.

He nodded at her assumption. "Yes, and I can hear sounds humans can't," he explained. "Like dog whistles."

He chuckled as she recalled the quote. "I kind of like that," Jimmy admitted. "It's strange, but cool."

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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-27 08:40 am UTC (link)
It made her a little sick to her stomach to think of the sounds the... creatures made floating in on the wind. She was so glad she didn't have those heightened senses right then. It must have been torture at times. She scrunched up her nose again, trying to focus on, "Eugh... Dog whistle. That can't be pleasant."

She blushed a little when she admitted, "I took me a couple of readings of those pages to realize 'Oh. Sam and Hailey had sex. Okay then. Moving on.' It's kind of weird like Francesca Lia Block's books For her I always remember, 'Morning. Strawberry sky dusted with white winter powder sugar sun. And nobody to munch on it with.'"

Alisa glanced up towards the ceiling when she half-muttered, "Get that feeling a lot."

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[info]little_jim
2011-01-27 08:56 am UTC (link)
They were pretty bad too. But when it came to those, Jimmy switched to his warrior mentality. Warpath knew those sounds as a warning the enemy was near and to prepare for battle.

As for the dog whistle, Jimmy flinched at the memory. "No it wasn't," he admitted wryly. "Especially when the kid didn't stop." That was when he'd lashed out and broken the other boy's arm. His long fuse had reached its limit and he'd just snapped. Jimmy didn't like to think or talk about those moments though. They were his greatest shame.

Oh, it was purple prose of sorts. Still, better than how it could be described. Her other quote hit harder to home. "Me too," he admitted, his gaze going back down to the floor.

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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-27 09:07 am UTC (link)
"Oh no," she said empathetical to his former plight, rolling her eyes. Really? No one could have blamed him for breaking the kids arm. She sure as Hell wouldn't have blamed him anyway and probably would have done the same. "God, I hope you kicked his ass from then until the next week."

Of sorts but everything was written like that. Or it was like Sylvia Plath had crawled out of her gr--wait, that wasn't a funny analogy anymore. She licked her lips, rubbing the back of her neck a little, "Oooh, look at me making things awkward."

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[info]little_jim
2011-01-27 09:16 am UTC (link)
Jimmy looked away and tensed slightly. "I broke his arm," he admitted. "It probably would have been worse, but Pete was standing right next to me and stopped me. He's stronger than me, thank Usen."

That had been hard to tell her. He wasn't proud of his temper and his violent fits of rage. They were a mark on his honor, on his tribe's honor, a weakness.

He looked down and shook his head. "It's not your fault, Alisa," he told her. "I get angry and lash out. Not very often, but it happens and when I do.." Did he really need to explain in detail what someone with his size and strength could do in a blind rage. He just shook his head because there really was no way to explain it to someone who didn't have the same problem.

Not any way he knew anyways.

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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-27 01:26 pm UTC (link)
Ooh, Jimmy had kicked his ass and didn't feel proud about it. Obviously. She was just screwing things up left and right wasn't she? As good at being social as she was and shit. Nice. Lovely.

"I understand about... lashing out," and it sounded like she really did but then she had been on the receiving end. Not that she was going to tell him that. As much as he felt comfortable sharing or as much as maybe she some how convinced him to share, she wasn't going to. No one needed to know about Him except people like Hank and Ororo.

They needed a distraction so she asked softly, "Um... Usen?"

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[info]little_jim
2011-01-27 03:52 pm UTC (link)
There was nothing to be proud of. Yes, the other boy had been cruel to him, but he should have walked away. Now, he would have taken the whistle away, perhaps crushed it into tinfoil. But at seventeen, new to his powers, his strength, he had just reacted.

Perhaps Alisa did. Jimmy couldn't blame her if she did. Something terrible had happened to her for her to hide away all the time. He didn't ask, she didn't offer.

Her question brought a small smile to his lips. "Usen is the lifegiver," he explained. "He taught the first Apache how to hunt, how to make medicine, after he defeated the dragon terrorizing our lands. He commands the mountain spirits and granted us our homeland." This was one of those things that was hard to explain in English, let alone in terms Christians understood.

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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-28 05:12 am UTC (link)
She never offered. No sense in upsetting people with things they couldn't possibly understand or fix or change. She'd dealt with it. She didn't want to bring it up and have to fucking deal with it again. Okay, maybe she hadn't really dealt with it. After all, she still was terrified and spent most of her time invisible...

Her first instinct was to say 'so he's a god' except as she recalled, things didn't exactly work that way in the various tribal myths. "So... Usen is like... the uber-spirit?" At least she didn't say god. "I want to hear about this dragon though."

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[info]little_jim
2011-01-28 07:35 am UTC (link)
Jimmy had never really come to terms with John's death or the deaths of his parents and the tribe. He had no room to talk there certainly.

"Basically," he agreed. "Christians would call him a god, and really that's what he is. The greatest of all the spirits, greater than the sky, the moon or the earth."

Of course she wanted to hear about the dragons. "The dragon or serpent, although the description fits what people think of dragons better than snakes, was far too wise and powerful to be killed. He kept eating one of the first women's children. Finally, after her last son was born, she dug a deep hole to hide him. She hid the opening and covered it with a fire. Whenever the dragon came, she claimed she had no more children because the dragon had eaten them all."

His dark eyes grew lively as he continued the tale. "The dragon thought she was lying, but he could never find the child. The woman went down every day to feed him, and the dragon never found him. But as he got older, he didn't want to hide anymore and the dragon saw his tracks. His mother hid him and lied to the dragon again, but he he was more suspicious and she lived in constant fear the dragon would find out and kill both of them."

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[info]aflyonthewall
2011-01-31 06:59 am UTC (link)
"I try not to go the god route with religions I don't know," Alisa shrugged. Especially with Native myths but that was really entirely beside the point. Okay, maybe she was raised a little too PC sometimes.

She settled in, leaning her elbows against her knees and listening with perhaps a ridiculous amount of respect. It wasn't every day you got treated to a story telling of such a degree. "Dragons are such bastards," she commented when he paused then blushed and covered her mouth with her hands. It wasn't polite to interrupt or something.

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[info]little_jim
2011-02-01 04:27 pm UTC (link)
It was a little overly politically correct. Calling Usen a god showed understanding of his might and importance. Jimmy had been much more tense about labels and correctly them when he was younger. Ororo's counsel and upsetting people by overreacting to well meaning attempts to understand his people's religion had taught him to not be so sensitive anyway.

"It is good to be respectful," he admitted, not wanting to discourage her when she was being sociable for the first time.

He had to chuckle at her observation. No it wasn't polite to interrupt, but comments like that generally meant you had your audience engaged in the tale.

"The boy decided he wanted to learn to hunt," he continued. "He begged his uncle to make him a bow and teach him. His mother said no, that the dragon and serpents and other beasts would eat him, but the boy said 'No, tomorrow I go.' The next day, with his new bow and arrows, the boy and his uncle went hunting. The boy finally made a kill, a deer. His uncle taught him to skin the animal and broil the meat. But the smell attracted the dragon."

Jimmy probably enjoyed this too much, storytelling was one of the few times that he enjoyed himself without having to be cajoled into it. He used his hands as he narrated, trying to help his listeners envision creatures like dragons made of rock and stone.

"The boy's uncle was terrified, frozen where he stood with fear. The boy was not afraid, which surprised the dragon. He told the dragon he would not eat him, eat his uncle or their kill. The dragon admired the boy's courage and indulged him in the challenge he issued. The dragon could take four shots at him with his bow and arrow, and if he survived, he would be able to do the same to the dragon with his new bow and arrows. The dragon, having three layers of scales made of rock and stone, knew the boy couldn't kill him with his puny arrows and warned him. But the boy insisted. So the dragon took his bow, a mighty pine tree taller than the mansion and his arrows which were saplings twenty feet long and fired at the boy."

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