Who: Tim & Marta/Sunshine
Where: A government building in the Capital
When: Afternoon-ish, recent
Warnings: Possible drug talk bc Marta, possible overuse of anime references bc of Tim
Jetlag. Disorienting as a Tabi boot to the head. Skipping across ponds and a good seven time zones while jet fuel and turbines raced against the sun(and won), it was a weird experience. Uncomfortably weird, and Tim never quite got used to it. For a man who fought off sleep at every turn, the exhaustion that came from flying halfway around the world and back again was very, very unwelcome. He needed caffeine and the illusion of absorbable vitamins. Note the twin cans of Monster energy drink wedged between his knees while he thumb-scrolled over the display on his phone, reading fine print through the red-lined squint of tired eyes behind his black rimmed glasses.
The police precinct building in the Capital was a large, gray structure composed of hundreds of offices dedicated to detective units yeah, but also probation offices and drug court judges, child protective services and gun licence renewals. More of a government-issued catch-all than only a precinct. With all that going on in the same building, any given day was a freaking madhouse hive of activity. Detectives, civilians, judges, and government office workers all buzzed around to service the queen bee of justice and order. Tim hated having to come down to the lower levels of the building during those 9-5 office hours because the claustrophobia was very real when one was sat scrunched shoulder to shoulder with twenty other people waiting for their number to be called.
Tim didn't have a number. Tim was waiting on one of the judges to get back from lunch so that they could discuss the warrant that Tim wanted yesterday and was still without. He fit in though, he looked like every other person who was sitting around waiting to turn in their probation fines or drug court paperwork. He had on plainclothes, jeans and an Akira sweatshirt with the hood up over his unbrushed but unslept-in hair. He looked like a college kid. An impatient one with his red sneaker tapping and squeaking against the freshly waxed floor of this particular waiting room. The repetitive squeaking was clearly getting on the receptionist's nerves, along with at least half of the waiting room. A woman with a crying baby gave him a dirty look. A big guy in a vintage Bulls jacket grit his teeth, but Tim continued to squeak his shoe against the floor. Back and forth, habitual and almost melodic in its annoyance because the sharp sound was helping to keep him awake just as much as the cans of sugar and caffeine.
Tim killed the first of his energy drinks and tossed the can without looking into a high arch over about nine chairs and heads so that it landed in the crowded room's only trash can.
Swish. Nothing but net. Or, in this case, nothing but bag.
He'd never done well with sitting still for long, and this had to have been some kind of record. An hour, and even if he wasn't exactly sitting
still(squeak! squeak! went his shoe again), he was beginning to get stir crazy. He tugged the red hood down off his head and scratched at the short, dark crop of his hair while he looked around the room of waiting civilians. Anxiety hitched a ride in his chest without any real explanation and Tim closed his eyes when he knocked his head back against the wall behind him. Under his breath, he talked himself down from the beating hammer of his own heart. "Alright, five more minutes... five more." He was just so tired, really. The Monster wasn't helping, and he rubbed at his eyelids from behind the lenses of his glasses. Five more...