sgt cal davidson. (resourcefully) wrote in remains_rpg, @ 2016-02-16 22:41:00 |
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Entry tags: | # 2019 [01] january, calvin davidson, karen sharpe |
i think these walls have a message or have changed--which it is, i can't decide.
Who: Sgts Sharpe & Davidson
Where: Capitol → LBJ
What: Best friends and partners touching base on their way to be big damn heroes.
When: Day 2 of the LBJ siege, January 9, morning
There was something off. He could sense it like a stutter in the engine—grit in the lens of a sensitive instrument, a rustiness in the apparatus that was their working relationship. When saddling up and loading their supplies into a truck, early, painfully early, before the rest of their department even started stirring (and if that didn’t cement how illicit their current action was, he didn’t know what would), Cal noted the way Karen moved. After so many years, he could read her body language like a book. Even if he didn’t know exactly what it signified. So Cal paused, right after shoving another box into the back of their truck. He cast his partner another look, trying not to let the concern bleed through into his expression. “All good, Kay?” That well-meant inquiry was truthfully nearly missed as so much distant static. Couldn't be helped, when the inward ruckus rang so much louder, so incendiary -- that grinding of metal on metal, a shattering of gears, and a whole world gone fully off its wheels. Such a tiny question it was, really, to try and fight its way around all that noise. Karen hefted a bag up into the truck-bed, paused, felt as though Cal had addressed her and she gave her friend a sideways glance. Hand lingering on the bag unconsciously, like an iron rod between them, she paused before replying (as if he had spoken gibberish, though the expression gave enough away). “Just fine,” she said, would have said also, were she standing in the same spot, hand affixed to some mortal wound at her side instead. Or whatever other grave scenario the imagination might concoct. Karen was enough of herself to nurse those protective instincts -- guarding who against what were moot arguments. “Distracted is all,” was the (poor) explanation that followed, Karen turning to the other boxes, simply away from questioning eyes. It was dark, and the sun had yet to bleed up from the horizon and stoke the cold, endless blue sky. Her hands looked chilled. He watched her mechanical movements, this automatic process of loading the truck, as if they were preparing for just another normal supply run. But they weren’t. This was something else entirely: filching supplies from the overstocked Capitol to bring them to people in dire straits. Going off the book, away from the letter of their duty. “We’re similar enough, Karen, that I know just fine doesn’t mean exactly that. I think I said those exact words on my way into quarantine, actually.” There was a grim sort of amusement in his voice, even as he opened the driver’s door and blew on his own hands to keep them warm. This was a woman who functioned as his other half, his unthinking right hand that he’d never had to question until yesterday. Until she wasn’t answering his messages or his calls and he’d had to wonder, not for the first time: What was Davidson without Sharpe? “This is a shit position we’re dragging you into. You’re allowed to voice concerns, you know,” he said, misreading her reticence. “It’s just me.” Karen shook her head, that familiar mop of sun-bleached hair falling in a wave down her face. She turned around and leaned against the back of the truck; close but turned away and just a step out of reach. “Oh hell, it ain’t even that,” she said. “I’ve got enough reason to go myself.” Partners they were, a team they had been since that fateful day they’d been assigned together, but now -- oh hell, her stomach sank to think that she’d been pushed off their shared path. Her hands sunk into the pockets of her jacket, digging around for the keys, for warmth. She continued, and it was with some effort, “I’m already involved up to the neck as it is, Cal.” Karen took out the truck keys, handed them over, palm up. What to share and what to keep; a bomb and a gun might not have done the deed, but fear might. His hand clenched around the keys she gave him. “Up to the neck, even?” the man repeated, dry and curious even despite himself. Leaning one boot against the runner, he peered at Kay across the back of the pickup. “You got any secret rebel activity you been hiding from me, Sharpe? A lover in the Hellhounds, maybe?” It was a joke, but it was the sort that bit at his own bitter wounds. Too many people in his life had ended up in bed with the raiders, until his paranoia had him looking at almost everyone anew, apart from this woman standing a few feet away from him. “Enough of that joking,” she said, and it had meant to be light. But the joke had cut somewhere, found purchase at a weak point. Karen had few precious things to protect in this harsh life, but her friendship with Cal, their partnership? That trust built between them wasn’t bargainable; not before the start of another dangerous venture out into the city, and not ever. “I know where my allegiance is at,” Karen said with certainty (determined suddenly to carry the weight of yesterday on her own). She pushed off the truck. He soon followed suit, slamming the tailgate shut and climbing into the driver’s seat. The seat was shoved back and angled up at just the right position, this truck moulded to him thanks to careful adjustment and long hours of driving. Comfortable. Familiar. Just like how rides with Karen were supposed to be. “Don’t worry,” Cal added wearily, even as he started up the engine. “I’m just joshing. I mean, here I am right next to you, ridin’ to help out LBJ no matter their own alliances. The friend of our friend ain’t necessarily our friend, but that doesn’t mean I want those people to fucking starve. We’ve got a job, you know?” It was all nervous talk like he usually did, Cal’s words filling up the silence, talking out his justifications for their little cavalry charge. It was going to blow up in their faces later, he just knew it. The superintendent would find the missing supplies. There was no way they’d get away with it in the long run. But that didn’t mean it wasn’t worth doing. Karen followed suit and eased into the seat beside him. Gripping onto the small comforts of familiarity and routine, her hands reached round for the seat belt. There was room to hide her concerns underneath Cal’s usual chatter, and she did, brushing troubled thoughts under duty -- waiting until his voice trailed off. “Come what may, it’s the right thing,” she said, definitive, reassuring. Her hand moved up (Karen’s shoulders shifted, unnoticeable, the breath she was holding), and like any old time, any other mission, she reached over to roughly muss her partner’s hair. “So let’s get to it, alright? You ready?” Cal gave an exaggerated mock-scowl at the touch, one hand patting his hair as if she’d ruined a carefully-coiffed look. Not so. He’d only hurriedly run a comb through his hair this morning, and it was still sticking up at odd angles. Then he traded in the look for a grin. “Ready as I’ll ever be.” (Something in his chest ached. That moment reminded him too much of Willa; he’d left her behind in Richland, for better or worse.) But Karen was here, and she was by his side again, and the sergeants were together—as they were supposed to be—and that meant everything was normal. Or at least, as normal as they could expect it to be for now, huddling in the eye of the storm, hoping nothing would fly up to kick them in the teeth. He took a deep breath, and turned the key in the ignition. |