Hermits United. Meet up every 10 years and swap stories about caves. [Mostly for Emily, but OTA MTW]

[badplanchaser]

((vague quasi-spoilers under cut))The problem with being safety conscious to the point of paranoia; broken; crazy; and used to living in buildings with lots of locks, seals, and blood tests is that when you're dumped into a fairy wood where you're expected to live in a little unsecured cabin that's in a compound that thinks "a tall wooden fence and

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[savesherself]

It's hard to keep track of the people in the barracks - new people keep showing up, others move to the castle, and some just disappear - but Emily tries to at least recognize everyone who lives here by sight, if not name.

She noticed the very well-armed blonde kid when he showed up. She noticed which cabin he ended up in. She hasn't noticed him coming out of his cabin since then, much less talk to anyone, and by now, she's decided maybe she should check on him. If nothing else, someone should make sure he's still alive in there.

When she gets close enough to hear him talking - obviously to someone, but not to anyone she can hear - she pauses, and just listens until he goes quiet. Chances he's talking on his comm and she just can't hear the replies seem slim. But so are the chances that he's dangerous in a way she can't handle, so she steps forward and knocks on his door anyway.

[badplanchaser]

Okay, so maybe Shaun has been not expecting anyone to bother him. And maybe he's a bit startled by the knock on the door. But he completely does not squeak. At all. Nope.

His first instinct is to whirl around to look at George for direction, but she has helpfully (or not-so-helpfully, in Shaun's opinion) disappeared. "U-uh... Just a second!" he calls out uncertainly, then hisses, "What the hell, George?"

Yeah, like I'm going to let you come across as even more insane to whomever has decided you're too much of a hermit. Just answer the door.

Shaun grumbles wordlessly to himself as he stalks to the door and yanks it open. "What?"

[savesherself]

Emily raises her eyebrows a little at his response to her existence, but that's the only real change in her expression. "Sorry to interrupt," she says dryly, eyes flickering briefly to his hand just to see if maybe he was on the comms, and then over his shoulder to confirm that he's really alone in there. And unless he had a very quiet friend hiding behind the door... yeah, he'd just been talking to himself. Okay then.

"Mostly, I just thought someone should check to see if you were still alive. You've been holed up in here since you showed up."

[badplanchaser]

"Yeah, I'm alive!" Shaun answered quickly, and managed not to grimace at the idiocy of that statement. If he could talk, he clearly wasn't amplified... "Uh, obviously. Just, I'm not really a big people person."

You used to be.

Shaun didn't respond, though he silently willed George to be quiet while he was talking to the very business-like woman in front of him. "Anyway, this place is sort of a death trap. All sorts of hidden corners, no defenses worth shit, and I've got a seriously limited supply of firepower, especially if there's not anywhere to get more ammo."

[savesherself]

A part of her wishes she'd brought Reid along with her. He's so much better at dealing with this sort of thing than she is, but she can't exactly ask the kid to wait while she gets the guy who's a little more experienced with psychosis.

"That's okay," Emily says with a flickering smile. "I'm pretty sure you're not the only one." She pauses, and then ventures slowly, "What're you expecting to need that firepower for? 'Cause... I've been here for a while, and nothing dangerous has ever gotten past the wall. I know it doesn't look like much, but..."

[badplanchaser]

"Well, I guess part of it's just habit," Shaun admits after a moment of staring at her in horror - the idea that some wood wall would be defense against anything is frankly terrifying naive to him. "Back home, it's not exactly safe to set up a little commune in the woods. Or even in the suburbs, without some serious security measures." But there are no zombies here.

Yet.

The blood suddenly drains from Shaun's face as he starts piecing together the "clearly there are not zombies here if we're still alive" knowledge with his knowledge of Kellis-Amberlee. There are no zombies here. But there is Kellis-Amberlee, because he's here. Universally-infecting, wildly contagious Kellis-Amberlee.

"Oh, fuck me."

[savesherself]

Emily had been about to ask why it wasn't safe, and what those security measures were for - she has a feeling it's not fairies - but that sudden change of expression stops her. He looks terrified, and he's coherent and seemingly lucid enough that there's a good chance whatever it is isn't just in his head.

"...um. No offense, but I think I'll pass. What's wrong?"

[badplanchaser]

Part of Shaun's brain decides, with that response, that he likes... whoever this woman is. She's his type of person. It might help to actually introduce himself, ask her name. When he's done freaking out.

"This might sound a little insane, but back home, there was this virus, Kellis-Amberlee, that... reanimated any mammal larger than 40 pounds if it was infected when it died. Zombies, even though the CDC told us to call them... doesn't matter." Shaun runs a hand through his hair and takes a deep breath. "Thing is, Kellis-Amberlee is universally infectious for mammals. And extremely contagious. Every mammal on the planet was infected, even if the smaller ones couldn't go into viral amplification."

He smiles crookedly and offers her his hand. "Hi, I'm Shaun Mason, and I have probably single-handedly made a zombie uprising inevitable."

[savesherself]

She's still staring at him in uncertain disbelief when he holds out his hand, and shakes it reflexively while she processes what he just said. She's pretty much come to terms with the whole "existence of magic" thing, here in the Wood and where some of the other people come from. Zombies are on a whole new level of weird, though, and she's going to need a moment to find a response.

"Emily Prentiss. FBI." That's reflexive too, some reassurance - to herself as much as him - that even if viruses and zombies are not something she's trained for, she's at least capable of dealing with the information calmly. Assuming she believes it, which... she's not sure she does. "This is going to sound like a dumb question, but when you say zombies...?"

[badplanchaser]

"Nothing magical, unless you count the magic of Science." He starts to gear up for an explanation.

How about inviting her inside? It's a bit dim, but it's not a pigsty and she can sit down. She might want to, the bomb you're dropping.

"Right. I knew that," he mutters under his breath, and glances sheepishly at Emily. "Uh, so, did you want to come sit down? I might be a crazy hermit, but I promise it's not too rank."

[savesherself]

And he's still talking to someone who's not there, which doesn't really help his credibility on the zombie front. But he's gone pretty quickly from snappy to apparently genuinely interested in talking to her, and it can't hurt to at least figure out what's going on in his head, whether or not it matches up with any external reality.

Emily nods a little, with a faint smile. "Yeah, sure. I'm getting the sense this isn't a conversation I really want to have standing on your porch..."

[badplanchaser]

If she asks about the "talking to someone who isn't there" thing, he'll tell her the truth. At least he knows he's crazy, right? That's gotta point to some measure of sanity outside of the hearing voices thing. Right

[savesherself]

Emily takes a seat on the far end of the bed, and watches him silently as he explains. The longer he talks, the more she frowns - and it's not exactly because she disbelieves him. If he's delusional about the virus and the zombies and everything, it's a remarkably coherent delusion, and not the sort of thing someone who's actually psychotic is likely to develop. She'd actually rather it were incoherent and completely insane.

"And I guess there's no way to tell if we're all infected with what we've got here in the barracks, huh?" she sighs finally, still a little distracted as she considers what he just told her.

[badplanchaser]

"Not really." Shaun sighs, and leans forward, elbows resting on knees. "If I had some blood tests on me, I could test for viral amplification, but... they're meant to give a negative result for people with dormant KA, and anyway I don't have any on me."

He falls silent for a moment. "I mean, if anyone gets a cold, we could put everyone in a small, enclosed space for a few days. Try to infect everyone. If everyone gets a cold, even just minor sniffles, you'd know they don't have KA. But short of that..."

Because everyone getting sick is the best plan in the middle of this crazy, difficult-to-defend place.

"Well do you have any better ideas?" Shaun snaps before remembering that he's not actually alone anymore, and Emily is not as accustomed to his insanity as his team was back home. Part of him actually wants to play it down - at home, he didn't give a shit, but it wasn't exactly hard to point out that his sister had been murdered by the vice presidential candidate and that he was still dealing with that. Here... no one knows

[savesherself]

"...not really, no," Emily answers slowly. She's watching him with an uncertain frown, but she doesn't look like she's planning to bail because she thinks he's a crazy person any time soon. She does think he's a crazy person, for the record - it's just not enough to scare her off.

She bites her lower lip, searching for a response, and finally just asks gently, "Who's George?"

[badplanchaser]

Well, the fact that she's not trying to discretely run for the hills is a plus. He doesn't mind her thinking he's crazy - he is, after all. He sighs, though - he had been almost hoping he could avoid having to actually talk about George with anyone.

"Georgia," he says quietly. "She was my sister. My best friend. Pretty much the only person in the world I trusted to have my back no matter what. She was--" He hesitates on the word, because people back home seemed to shy away from calling it what it was, but it's the truth, so he barrels ahead. "She was murdered, about a year ago. I hear her, in my head. And have recently started seeing her, sometimes. Yeah, I am aware that I'm pretty much insane, by the way," he adds defensively.