Who: Jake Chambers, Oy, and Sarah Petrelli What: Making a connection Where: Hyperion Hotel When: Christmas Day (backdated) Rating: PG Status: incomplete ; thread
There was nothing for him to do, but Jake wouldn't have used the word 'bored' to describe how he was doing. There were too many other feelings going on in order for boredom to really register. Worry over Niki and how she had turned up, seemingly insane and now tainted in away he hadn't felt before. It hurt to see her in that state. Admittedly, Jake didn't know her all that well, but she had been kind to him and tried to help him find a place to live, maybe even a place to call home. It wasn't her fault things had gone so wrong.
The hotel made him feel nervous. Jake had heard much about the security system, and wanted nothing to do with it. Computers. Technology. They were all so damned dependent on it, but no one seemed to realize the danger. Jake had seen, more than enough times, the insanity left behind to poison those artificial minds after the world had moved on. In this place, the building was defended and guarded by artificial means. He had questioned that at first, asking how anyone would know if the computer started to think for itself. The scarred man, the one they called a champion, had explained that he could somehow talk to the machines. Like Micah, apparently. But that was as far as Jake had let the man explain. He didn't want to know the details. He didn't care for the details. He still wouldn't trust them.
In the days they had been here, ever since the Asian child-thief had brought them here, Jake had been doing his very best to avoid the other children. Any of them. All of them. Especially the ones who had been at Niki's with him. The ones who had gotten the glimpse of the gunslinger he was through the facade of the child he also was (though Jake sometimes suspected that his physical age was the only thing still linking him to that descriptor). They had seen the killer, and it had scared them. For all they had seen, done, and been through, Jake still stood apart from them.
Gunslinger. Killer. The line of Eld. Roland's ancient sandalwood revolvers. Had the metal of those guns truly been forged from the sword of Arthur Eld? The sword called Excalibur? Roland said yeah, do ye ken? and so Jake believed. Gunslingers. Knights. The last defenders of the White in a world that had moved on. He would never be the same. He would never be just a boy, no more than he would ever be John Chambers again. Too adult to be a child. Too young to be an adult. Even the kids he'd met at Niki's, each one far older than their years, had been frightened (or at the very least, 'creeped out') once they had caught a glimpse of that inner steel that made Jake a gunslinger.
Maybe it would just be easier to stay alone. Keep away from others, and resign himself to a quiet, lonely life.
"Ake!"
Well, maybe not entirely lonely.
Jake leaned back, moving his elbows off his knees in order to give Oy room. The billy-bumbler plopped himself down on Jake's lap. resting his head on the boy's thigh and half-lidding his eyes in contentment when Jake began to stroke his back. The garden out here was a pleasant area, quiet and closed off, hidden from the roads by the hedges. With a little imagination, you could pretend you weren't in the city. Until you breathed the air, anyway. After so long in Roland's world, Jake could taste difference the air. It almost made him want to wear a mask to avoid getting anything harmful into his lungs. Except for this spot. The garden was clean, nearly cleansing. It was cared for and protected. And, the biggest selling point, empty.
Though not for much longer. Jake sensed someone else's presence, approaching, but he didn't look up. Whoever it was, they weren't looking for him. No one had any reason to look for him.