the skittish
Characters: Hannah and Rusty Setting: leaving the courtyard, block b
Compliancy was something Hannah was well versed in. She nodded and although still tense, relaxed enough to actually have a conversation. “Oh,” she said, scooting closer to the corner, “Who are you?” It normally wouldn’t have been such a forward sounding question had she not half blurted it out. It was a rather broad question too. A name would have sufficed, but who are you? was always much more complicated.
"Rusty. Or Russ. Or Russel. Or Fuckup. Kinda whatever you wanna call me." Rusty answered, getting into the elevator, and he hit the button to take them down. "What's your name?" he asked, thinking she was a very strange girl, and he was going to have to kinda watch it around her. He knew skittish. He was skittish.
Hannah swallowed a bit hard. “I’m Hannah,” she replied, bunching up the fabric of her shorts more in her hands. “Did you do bad things too?” Her voice went to almost a whisper and she was unnecessarily cautious both about asking it and in being around him. Though as soon as the doors began to shut, Hannah gasped slightly. She wasn’t normally this jumpy at an elevator.. but the unknown was definitely unpredictable and she was well aware of the unknown.
Rusty stood with his back against the wall. "Um. Kinda? Maybe? I guess it depends on what you mean by 'bad'. But I think everyone here is in that boat." he said hesitantly. When she gasped, he jumped, and looked around wildly then back at her. "I can just leave you alone, I can just go away when the doors open and I swear I'm not gonna hurt you or anything!" he rushed to blurt out, holding his hands up to show he wasn't armed.
His reaction startled Hannah more. Her reaction was much more subtle though, simply staring wide eyed even through the silence that followed. The elevator moved, and Hanna waited for the doors to open again. “I like Rusty,” she said finally, referring back to his abundance of different names. His overzealous admission to not be out to hurt her almost comforted her in the strangest way possible. Maybe things weren’t as scary as they seemed. Either way, she definitely preferred safer company than none in this place.
"Okay." Rusty said, still not sure what the hell to expect, and when the elevator door opened, he literally dashed outside and ran a ways down into the tunnel to get very far away from her. Well out of any distance that could even remotely put them in contact. Unless she was a cyborg. Then she could totally pull something crazy, but he didn't really believe in them. He kinda wanted to, but he didn't.
While Hannah was certainly not a cyborg of any kind, she wasn’t quite sure what he expected of her. Where else would she go other than the same way he did? So she followed, unsure of whether they would run into one another again or not by the time she got where she was going. Where was she going now anyway?
Rusty kept a big, healthy distance between them, still also not sure what to expect. He got to the other elevator, and was torn. So he wound up backing way off, and motioning for her to take it.
“Are you ok?” she asked a tad loudly so he could hear her while approaching closer. Rusty’s own odd behaviour somehow managed to keep hers at bay. She was more curious now and almost exceptionally understanding. “I mean...” she became a lot quieter, “Am I scary?”
He really had to consider that. "You seemed all scared, and I don't like scaring people, scaring people only works out if you're scary and I'm really not scary, so I don't want to scare you, and so I figured I'd just go right the hell away where I could be not scary." he rambled all in one breath.
A small, nearly inaudible laugh escaped Hanna’s lips so she covered them with one of her palms. “No,” she said, withdrawing the hand, “I guess you’re not really... I just didn’t know what to expect. I mean, I just woke up here. One day I’m in prison the next... I’m here.” She looked over to the new elevator. “You’d think I’d be used to it by now,” she added in a soft tone. “We can still go look at that farm though...”
Rusty tilted his head to the side and eyed her. "...er. What do you mean 'you'd think I'd be used to it by now'?" he asked, thinking that kinda didn't make sense to him. He felt like he'd missed a step or something. But she was seeming less skittish, so it helped calm down his own flailing.
Hannah shook her head, “I just... moved around a lot unexpectedly,” she only half lied. Taking in a breath and holding it with her thoughts, she exhaled and wandered into the elevator as it opened. “We may as well go together... we’re going to be next to each other for awhile I guess.”
"Okay." Rusty said, deciding he guessed he'd have to suck it up and go with this. He got into the elevator, and tried to make sure he calmed down more. Awww, lil Fuckup's all skeered! Jessy's voice murmured to him. It's adorable, in that hideously pathetic way everyone in the world would hate.
Though Hanna had become much more relaxed, she was still on her toes. She waited for him to join her and then pressed the button to get them back up. “When did you get here?” she asked, throwing him a glance while trying to make light conversation which would be much less awkward than silence.
"This morning? I dunno. I woke up to the alarm on the computer." Rusty said. Though he did grin at the mention of the computer. "I have a computer!" he said brightly. Then realized that might be weird. "Which is...er..fun. And stuff. When did you get here?"
Her brows rose with his exclamation. At least it didn’t have her jumping ten feet into the air. “I guess I got here at the same time you did,” she answered, “I mean, I just woke up here.” Hannah sighed at the thought of earlier. There was so much going on at once it seemed that she wasn’t quite sure how she was to take it all in. Even as she stood in the elevator with a near stranger, every part of her ached to just go back where she was before everything started, before the trial. She wanted guidance to tell her what she should be doing. In a way, being stuck in the elevator as it moved made her appreciate Rusty for all it was worth at that moment.
When the elevator opened again, Rusty got out, and glanced around the empty space, before he walked towards the farm area again. "So we're both new. And things are super weird here." he observed. "There's a farm, and stocks, and people being extremely stressed out...and...yeah. Weird."
“Would it be so bad if we just stayed in our rooms?” Hannah questioned out loud with a bit of a smile as she followed him out. “Though I really like farms. I used to play in my grandmother’s corn fields with my siblings,” she trailed off, turning her smile into a bit of a frown. “I can’t imagine how any of this is normal though.”
"That's kinda what I planned on doing when I first left. Just head on back to my room and like, figure out what the hell I've gotten into." Rusty admitted. "I've never been on a farm in my life." he added. "So, yay for you and a familiar place?" he suggested.
“It’s not very familiar to me anymore,” she assured, returning her hands to the bottom of her shorts. “If you’re next to me, would it be so bad if I visited?” Now she started to feel awkward. It was hard trying to get along in life with everyone thinking they knew who you were and forcing you to be that person. Yet what she seemed to be at a loss of was having that one person always there to help her be new and better... He was gone from her life now, but what should she do? Her brain seemed to click in some wrong associations and as it did, she took a step closer to Rusty, but stayed behind a bit, her eyes casting downwards.
"No, you can visit." Rusty said, not wanting to offend anyone, though he wasn't sure why she might. He was an awkward person at best, and he'd been stunningly twitchy so far with her. Which was lame of him, he knew, and he was glad she didn't seem to be thinking he was a dumbass or something. Or, if she was, she was doing a good job of hiding it.
Hannah was quiet, being careful to keep aware of their surroundings. She trailed her eyes along the ground, turning her head towards the first of the doors in block B. It wasn’t often she freely wandered with a man and even though his demeanor was something she was used to in herself, she found it hard to understand any proper sort of mannerisms to cope with alleviating it.
Trying hard not to fall behind, Hannah took a quick step forward and accidentally bumped into him. With a gasp, she jumped back and instinctively apologised, “I’m so sorry!” she said, tightening her eyes shut in some sort of anticipated lash back.
Rusty jumped when she bumped into him, and made a run for it again. He took off, and didn't stop til again, he was so far away he actually had to raise his voice a little to be heard. "...I'm kinda not okay with being so up close and personal with people til I know them waaaay better." he said.
Hannah’s eyes remained shut until she heard his voice in the distance. She felt the world spin a little in her thoughts. What was she even trying to do? There was no comfort here for her. She could grasp at a false sense of relief but that was all it was ever going to be. “I... think I’m going to go to my room now,” she said, feeling extremely uncomfortable as she looked around for the correct direction she was to go.
"Okay!" Rusty called. "Um...hope your day goes better!" he added, genuinely hoping that, even if he was going to wait til he was feeling slightly better before he attempted to talk to her again. He needed to calm down, probably. Get his bearings.
Making an odd face bred from anxiety Hannah slowly stepped backwards before turning to the direction of her room. As she went, she kept a watchful eye behind her, glancing back every so often.