lookforheaven (aucontraire_) wrote in remains_rpg, @ 2016-01-28 12:05:00 |
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Entry tags: | # 2019 [01] january, adelaide hawkins, ian terrell |
WHO: Montgomery kids
WHERE: At the Dog Park gates
WHAT: REUNION
WHEN: Evening, January 7th
It was both a disaster and a triumph, a horror show and the answer to her every hope, and in being all those things the jailbreak was everything that Adelaide had expected. She is simultaneously ashamed and proud to have planned the whole horrible business. None of it matters. As the sniping team finally speeds away from the mess on the backs of the patches’ bikes, scraping away by the skin of their teeth, Adelaide holds on with one arm and with the other reads the messages on her phone - Jims and Sarge are home, they are safe, they are alive. Nothing else matters. The leather of Pickles’ cut is wet under her fingers, blood that has seeped down from the deep graze of a bullet on the outside of her shoulder. Too shallow to worry over, but deep enough that fat drops trail in the wind behind the bike. That doesn’t matter, either. And so they reach the gates of the Dog Park and the sentries open them to admit the small gaggle of bikes, and before they have even fully stopped she is off. He’s there and he’s a mess, pale and thinner than he’s been since they were small and scraping for food, and injured maybe everywhere, and Adelaide is sure she’s a mess herself, soot-smeared and bloody, scraped and tattered and weary. She starts to run and her feet betray her and she touches the hard-packed dirt ground with one hand to regain her balance and keep on hurrying to him. Tired doesn't even begin to describe how Sarge feels, he's hurt and hungry and dirty and hasn't really slept since before they got arrested. But all of that doesn't matter right now. It's still hard to believe that they actually escaped that hellhole, most of them relatively unharmed. Rodeo is still unconscious, and Tesla didn't make it. That particular information will need some time to process still, and the reality of having lost another brother will come crashing down eventually. For now he is trying his best not to fall over while he waits for the rest of their rescue team to come back, tense and anxious and ready to snap because someone told him that Addie was out there with the rest of them and he is worried sick. Until the gates open and he doesn't even need to look for her, of course he finds her right away and has started walking before he even knows it. Sees her stumble and then run and even though he can't run and he's pretty sure some of the stitches the Doc gave him need renewing he is limping as fast as he can, blood stains and all. It doesn't matter that everyone is there, as soon as Addie is within reach he grabs her and crushes her against him until her feet lift off the dusty ground and resolves not to let go until he passes out. Or Rodeo wakes up and separates them, whatever comes first. He notices that she is injured, somewhere at the periphery of his mind, and once he has returned from his happy place he'll make sure that is taken care of. But for now he'll just stand there, swaying just a little, scrambling to find any words while emotions come crashing down around him so hard he has to hide his face in her hair. Adelaide is on her tiptoes until they don’t touch anymore, and she knows that she should stop him lifting her but she can’t let go long enough and trying to might kill her just as much as a busted stitch might kill him. Her arms wrap tight around his neck, the fingers of one hand fisting in the back of his filthy shirt and the other hand pressing the back of his head as he bows down into her, and his hair is longer than usual and unkempt but he’s so crushingly familiar Adelaide isn’t sure she’ll survive it. Her cheek presses in against the side of his neck and it is wet with hysterically happy weary tears and she’s not even sorry for them. Maybe it’s all melodramatic, but her affections aren’t split among all that many people and so sometimes the weight of them for one single person just bowls her over completely. She can’t even release her grip enough to look at him, and so when she speaks it’s muffled against the side of his neck. “Jims? Is he okay?” she asks, the only other thing that could possibly interject here, the wondering where their other piece is. It's one of those things Sarge couldn't even begin to understand with other people. Old ladies getting all weepy whenever they go out, and getting just as weepy when they come back. Until they found Addie all his caring was focused on Rodeo, at least most of it, and even if they wouldn't go out together anyway Sarge would never think of any display more dramatic than a grunt and a clap on the shoulder. Never did, until now. Addie fits him like a puzzle piece and she's family and then some and he almost died, he went through what has to be the worst first trip in recorded history and he thought he would never see her again. And yet they are here, they are free and he has to come to terms with having a lot more time with her in the future, which doesn't sound all that impossible. If he was the crying type he just might right now, but he isn't so his eyes just itch something awful and there's a baseball lodged in his throat somewhere. Reality does pull at him when she asks about Rodeo, and he gingerly puts her back down, but can't quite bring himself to step away. “He, uhm. Got knocked out, gonna be fine.” There is a great deal of fidgeting and decidedly not looking at her going on as he tries to figure out how to break the news to her. “He… I talked to him. He knows…. About…,” and he gestures between them in his helpless kind of way, and is once again mortified that the whole conversation they had was anything but private. As soon as Sarge eases back to not-look at her, still holding tight, definitely not the least bit of room between them for the holy ghost or anybody else, Adelaide is examining his face - bruised, battered, but that is not so very new. Her fingers are always itchy when she’s with him and the hand that’s in his hair moves to ghost over the bruising, yellowed and old, on the ridge of his cheek. Until he makes his revelation, and her fingers still, her mouth pops open in surprise. “How did he take it?” she asks, looking alarmed at first. Then, in a slow bloom, she starts to grin, despite the way her cheeks are still wet, and her eyes warm with the idea. “What did you say?” she asks, both delighted and intrigued by the very idea of Sarge putting - this - into words, somehow. For serious, one-grunt-where-ten-words-would-do Sarge to voluntarily face down something like that conversation. She isn’t surprised, exactly, but the curiosity may actually eat her alive. Oh, to have been a fly on that wall. She realizes it’s a miracle that Sarge only almost died in there the one time. His regret is obvious the moment he alluded to what happened in La Quinta. Sarge would use any excuse possible to get out of this one, but he has always been an exceptionally horrible liar, and Addie is able to read him like nobody else. So that is out of the question. Just like running. There is no way he will leave any time soon. Or ever. All he can do is shift around like a little boy that has been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. He even forgets to be uncomfortable about her touching his face. Some of those bruises are probably from her brother, it is hard to keep track of everything when your days are a blur of fights, sorry excuses for food, more fights and sometimes even fights. That certainly has to be ranked among their top three bad moments and he'd rather forget all about it, but she needs to know because there is no way her brother won't mention it. “Really well. Only punched me a couple times. Probably cause his hands were busted already,” he mutters, slowly finding his way back to his usual slow drawl, still searching for the words but not pushing them out one at a time. “Told him ‘bout…,” again the hand waving, busted knuckles and swollen fingers slowly flapping about, “You know. Kissing.“ It's a good thing that he doesn't blush and that with all the grime and damage from numerous sunburns it is hard to tell that his ears are pretty damn red. Sarge looks down and sees that there is a mirror outline of the red stain on his shirt presently on hers, and he grumbles. “you're hurt.” And so is he but that is not important whatsoever. He's been stabbed before, no big deal. “Oh for cryin’ out loud,” Adelaide huffs, though Rodeo’s response was certainly not unexpected. There’s a reason why Telling Him was something both of them thought of as a task, as something to be approached. Adelaide feels like she could almost be mad at Sarge for taking it upon himself to do solo, except that the idea of him actually doing it also intrigues her so much. The idea of him thinking of her, making the effort to form words about them is really far more intriguing than it has any right to be, and that’s one of the many ways she knows she’s an utter goner. And so instead of being mad, she lifts her brows at him, lets her wandering hand down to alight at his collar, and shakes her head. “You’re some kind of masochist deciding to spill it all to him in a place you can’t even get out of, and without me,” she says. “‘Least he’s not the one who stuck you,” she adds, and it tries to be light but thoughts of his injury are far too heavy for that. Though she’s reluctant, they finally are able to part enough to observe the state they’re in, and Adelaide gives him a familiar sardonic look. “Right, I’m hurt,” she says, but then the sight of that blood stirs her up again and she goes back on tiptoe to squeeze hard around his neck, like it helps her stave off the memories of being stranded here, helpless, while she didn’t know if he would live. “If you don’t quit trying to die all the time, Sarge, I swear to god..” she says. When she can let go she grabs his hand, the dried blood on her own fully ignored just now though the burn and throb in her arm is growing harder to ignore. “They already take Jims back home? Come on, you can grumble all you want but I’m looking at those stitches.” Admitting his motives for instigating that talk might just be even harder than talking about the thing itself, and Sarge catches himself squirming under her touch ever so slightly. It's subtle enough, and yet so obvious. He doesn't like looking uncomfortable, even though he does it all the damn time. “Thought we was gonna die in there,” he grumbles through gritted teeth, eyes on some patches cleaning up behind her, moving around guns and bikes and generally being obnoxious by existing in the vicinity of this reunion scene. “Almost did. They gave us Prax ‘n all.” Pretty much everyone knows at least enough about that stuff to give them an idea of just how much damage it could do, and if he hadn't been uneasy about distributing it before, albeit in a vague kind of way, this definitely would have changed his mind. Sarge still can't understand why people keep wanting more, because those hours he spent in solitary clawing at the walls to get away from the hallucinations are in the top five worst moments of his life. Somewhere in his tired body he finds the strength to summon a lopsided grin. “Can't help bein’ so damn charmin’ people want me dead.” There are distant thoughts about him not valuing his own life enough to make an honest effort, but that is a moot point if Addie tells him to try. He can't help but listen to that. “He's gonna keep half the place awake with his sleep concerts soon enough. Where's the little fella?” He thought he was going to die, and instead of doing the easy thing and keeping his mouth shut, he did what he of course thought was the right thing, and made a clean breast of it. His conscience sure is a hell of a thing. There’s bemused admiration in her eyes while Adelaide starts moving them off away from this public scene, but when Sarge makes his admission she stops again, looks up into his face to examine his expression. It’s not often that she is shocked. She’s seen enough in her life, been exposed to plenty the way she was brought up and after as the world went off the tracks, but his admission about the Prax brings her up short. She grips his wrist, a desire to protect and soothe though it’s of course too late for that, but she doesn’t fuss the way some might. She knows that he can take it, that he will take it, but she sure as hell does wish he didn’t have to. “I’m guessin’ that was as bad as you’d think,” she says grimly, because what can you really even say? They both know full well that all of them have enough demons crawling just beneath the surface that there’s no way a trip like that is going to be a pleasant one. Especially not for Sarge, who works so hard every minute to keep that stuff at bay, who hates to be locked up more than just about anyone even without something additional like that. The fact that he is standing here with her, talking about it all, and still trying, not running away from her - that all means something. When he asks about Charlie a brief smile touches her, and then without warning she tucks herself into his side under his arm - just try and stop her - because excessive affection is threatening to pour in and drown her. “He’s with old Maude, we gotta stop and get him,” she says, leading the way. “You’re not back a minute too soon. He’s gonna walk any second,” she adds, a funny mix of pride and nerves in her voice that’s unusual for her. It’s overwhelming to think about, to know that the baby who was little more than a pink blob when they all reunited, is on his way to being a real live person, and she doesn’t know if she’ll ever get used to it. “Almost his birthday,” she adds. Even in a different world where Sarge is inclined to talk about anything personal he is not sure he would even find the words to talk about La Quinta, about what those endless hours in solitary were like even before they so graciously supplied him with a dose of Prax. The fear of everything crawling right underneath his skin has always made Sarge wary of drugs, made him stay away as far as he could because he was afraid of what might happen. As it turns out, his usual pessimistic outlook hit the nail right on the head, and he will remember being visited by the corpses of everyone he feels he has let down, all of their accusations drowned out by the voice of his father. Addie pulls him back to the present with her hand around his wrist, but he doesn't look at her. Doesn't think he can, not yet. It will take a while to wrestle all those things back into their tidy boxes, and he doesn't want to share his most broken parts with anyone, not even her. There are things in his past not even Rodeo knows about, because he would rather die than having anyone find out. He merely shrugs, and grumbles. It could be interpreted as an affirmative sound, or maybe a dismissal, it wasn't so bad. Sarge really wants her to think that it wasn't, so he doesn't add more to her worries that are plenty even without this. That brief smile does register with him and he just hesitates for a few moments when he finds himself confronted with the reality that Addie is a lot less hesitant about public displays of affection than he is. Slowly and gingerly he extends his arm and lightly rests it around her shoulder, as if she could break. The subject of Charlie is a very welcome distraction. Sarge knows very little about children, all gathered from watching her grow up raised by boys who didn't know the first thing, and later when he had the questionable pleasure to act as a replacement father. One thing he does know is that they seem to grow and progress at an unfair speed, so that if you blink you might miss something. And they have been gone for… he doesn't even know how long exactly. “He ain't drivin’ yet?” His head tilts towards her ever so slightly, and under all the dirt and bruises and layers of exhaustion there is a spark of humor refusing to give up just yet. Adelaide is aware that the spot she takes at his side is very likely to make Sarge uncomfortable. She also knows that she’s been without him and her brother for far too long, and that both of them could actually probably use the hand in walking - not that Sarge would ever admit that, not that he wouldn’t crawl the entire way if it came to it. The move isn’t overtly amorous - she isn’t the type for that, either - but proximity feels like more of a need than a want right now, and she’s glad when Sarge does the Sarge-version of taking it in stride. The reluctance of his arm going around her shoulders doesn’t bother her, it only goes to show that it’s all something he’s serious about. His humor is one of those scraggly green weeds that grows like a small miracle on the side of a cliff face, and she looks sidewards at his profile, that small smile lingering. “Don’t you go rushing him, I told him he’s gotta wait til he’s potty trained, at least,” she murmurs back, their mutual exhaustion subduing the exchange, but they are together and it is good. Maude’s place is right on the way back to Rodeo’s trailer, and the old woman is sitting in the shade with the tow-headed baby on a blanket. As soon as he sees their approach Charlie lifts his arms and opens and closes his palms, gives a shout of “Muh!” and shifts straight into an expert crawl across the blanket. He’s so much bigger than he was when Jims and Sarge went away, and she is only now realizing it now, seeing Charlie as Sarge must. Adelaide scoops him up, ignoring the protest from her bullet-grazed arm though she situates Charlie on the opposite hip while she presses a kiss to his temple and he looks supremely satisfied. He raises that grabby hand toward Sarge, and yells again, while Adelaide thanks Maude and starts to move on - she’s impatient to see Jims for herself, to look over Sarge’s probably-busted sutures. “Let's go home,” she says, feeling like she hasn’t been since they were gone. It seems that his brain has been scrubbed clean of all information regarding movement of limbs and whatever bit was left of his communication skills and Sarge feels like a mumbling, stumbling robot. Especially when his foot catches on a stone and he barely catches himself, mumbling incoherently with the occasional audible swear words, managing to remove his arm so he doesn't pull Addie down with him. A long time ago, when his nights were often spent wide awake, listening for telltale signs of his old man going off the deep end, and his days scrounging got something edible he was the same kind of bone tired, a special kind that goes beyond mere exhaustion. Because it's not just a tired body, it's the mind as well, raw and hurting and just an ugly mess. This place has been home, their very own place, forged with the hope of more than just survival. Sarge looks left and right as they walk, noticing subtle changes every now and then and he doesn't feel like coming home at all. Maybe in a few days he will, once he has processed what happened. He was so certain that he would die locked up that this feels intensely surreal. A considerably wider smile - by his standards anyway - tugs at the corners of his mouth in this unusual upward direction when Addie picks up Charlie, and while he usually would have taken the little guy, who seems to have doubled in size, but he's covered in blood and filth and doesn't trust his legs or his arms too much right now. Instead he reaches over to muss through soft hair and has his hand taken hostage as Charlie keeps patting his busted knuckles, babbling and cooing in that way that even affects a guy like Sarge. When the trailer is in sight he relaxes, just a little, because he knows someone already brought Rodeo over and there will be clothes that are comparatively clean and that haven't been worn for weeks and he can find a corner to sleep in without worrying about anyone getting stabbed. He holds the door open and rolls around thoughts heavy like boulders, trying to arrange them like a very complicated puzzle. “Good to be back,” he mumbles, and from him that is the closest to an emotional breakdown as it gets. |