[43.00] Locked from Dexter, 60% // Manhunt
Looking for Even. Get me a lead and, I don't know, I'll give you.... a cookie.
[Locked to Kage]
That... "roster" thing you have. Even's still on it, yes?
People go missing around here entirely too often.
[Locked to Kage]
That... "roster" thing you have. Even's still on it, yes?
People go missing around here entirely too often.
[He takes the bottle and unscrews the top, but he still doesn't look at Erol. His tone of voice isn't directed anywhere in particular, and if Erol weren't there Kage might have been speaking to the atmosphere.
Nevertheless, he pauses to drink, then continues.]
Technically it ain't part'a my name, but I got this--title. Informal, shitty thing given t'me by shitty, worthless folk but once I got told that it don't matter th'source as long as it's the truth.
[He wipes his nose with his thumb, haunted green eyes staring at a spatter of blood on the far wall.]
Al-Mawt. Kage Al-Mawt. Means... No fuckin' translation in this language. Death-bringer. Unlucky. Kage the Ill-Omen, the bad moon on the horizon. Means that anythin' around me gets damaged.
[His eyes slide smoothly, gaze rippling over the wall, the bookshelf, the glass door of the balcony, finally onto Erol's eyes. His gaze is hard as glass, burning like a malaria fever. He jerks his head towards the door suddenly.]
So get th'fuck out.
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Ah. But that's the smart thing to do. The logical thing, the act of... self-preservation.
[He narrows his eyes, a cat's expression, but doesn't blink.]
I loathe "smart" decisions, and I've no interest in self-preservation. So I think I'll stay.
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[Kage holds that catlike, amber gaze steadily. There's no threat in his voice, just a still, calm certainty. There's something deeper in his voice and for a moment it almost seems as if there's some absolute, perfect knowledge in what he's saying.]
Perhaps not with my hand. Perhaps against my fuckin' will. But you
will
die.
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I was dead before I got here.
[Bullets, Metal Heads, zoomer crashes, Dark Eco, Pyramid Head, Xamira - they were nothing. What was killing him was this boat, the sheer tedium and placidity of it. He would do anything to keep from drowning, becoming a dull edge, losing himself.
And right now Kage was looking like a pretty fucking good liferaft.]
No great loss.
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[And just like that, the intensity is gone. Kage straightens up and turns his face to the side so he can stare at another spatter of blood on the wall. There's a roaring, screeching pain in him that makes him deaf and dumb.]
All you cattle're fuckin' pure. I fuckin' wondered why you were a passenger'n now I know. All fuckin' praise Redd, wise, great man that he is.
[The man who sent Even away.
The roaring intensifies, grows louder until it's like a physical force in Kage's head, a maelstrom of screaming, gnashing, of animal parts and divine machinations, of hideous intentions and a keening grief that is vivisecting him when he thought no surgery would or could be done.]
All praise Zeshat.
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[The question is idle, bored. Erol's mildly curious, but he doesn't actually CARE. He had nowhere else to go, no quest to return to, no life he would pick up again. Not that he knew of. The Elegante was as good a place as any - better than some - to continue living. So he didn't have the burning passion to know what was going on behind the scenes that some others did.
He takes the bottle, swigs a mouthful, swallows it in a burning gulp. Fucking smooth. Then he hands it back: Keep drinking.]
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[Kage inhales, exhales suddenly when the bottle is thrust into his hand. He looks down at it in surprise, then pulls from it until he has to stop for air, pushes it back.]
You'll find out.
[Reddreddreddredd where did you send him where did you send him Kage's got to find Even again
he might not be dead
he might not be dead
Kage realises that he had stopped breathing while the screaming in his head continued, while this new thought occurred to him, and he consciously inhales deeply. Fill the lungs. Exhale. Repeat until you not longer have to think about it. ]
Off the boat is death.
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Well, I'd stopped thinking it was a genuine ocean some time ago. Between going in one direction for five months and the convenient island.
[That's quite a lot of alcohol to imbibe at once. Kage will feel THAT in the morning - but that'll mean he'd have slept, which was a good thing.]
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[Kage's voice is listless as the alcohol starts to warm his face, his fingertips.]
When y'look out the balcony. What colour izzit.
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[Hmm. This is an interesting twist.]
Blues, grays, greens.
[He wants to ask - why, what color SHOULD it be, or why does it matter, but instead he waits.]
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[No answer. He doesn't move from his slump against the wall except to slowly stub the remains of his cigarette out beside his leg, then methodically draw the pack from his jacket pocket and--
A silver zippo.
He lights up, puffs, replaces the zippo in his pocket.]
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Turnabout's fair play. What do you see?
[Another mouthful of that heavily-spiced rum. A little went a long way, but they were headed on a long trek, so. The more the better.]
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Same thing.
[He inhales and he can smell Even. The scent is like a kick in the gut and he closes his eyes in pain, dragging viciously on his cigarette, sucking hard, wishing wishing wishing
But reality is still there when his lungs are full of toxic smoke and he can't pull any more poison inside. Kage exhales, then seems to remember that hey, Erol is there.]
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Then why ask.
[He eyes the bottle. Keep at it, he says without saying, won't do a thing for your pain but it'll numb you tonight, knock you out and put you to bed. And when you wake up you'll have something else to worry about besides your missing other half.
Erol might not have the capacity for empathy or sympathy, but he could tell what a shattering blow this had been for the other man.
He liked Kage. And he was a good one to have at your back, a good one to know. Better yet, if his own words were true, a risky one to be around. So Erol cared enough to see he made it through the night intact, preferably in a drunken stupor.]
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Kage's breathing harder, his eyes squeezed shut as he remembers the end of their last fight. They laid together, matching breath, the scent of Even's sweat, the shampoo, tobacco--
"Stoppit," Even had protested as Kage had scrubbed his fingernails into the growing shock of hair on Even's head. It had been dyed black.
"Maybe if I keep washin' it, the black'll come out," Kage had grinned, then shoved Even under the spray of the shower.
In the present he inhales again, every nerve screaming in pain. He can't take it. He can't fucking take it. He can't--
Kage suddenly pushes to his feet and crosses to the desk where he lays down the silver zippo. Without looking at Erol, he leaves the room, dropping the bottle with a dull thunk on the carpet. His bare feet pad down the corridor to where a weaponslocker is. Kage slaps his hand into the centre of it and once his identity has been confirmed it pops out.
Just one bullet. Revolver. Kage loads it in and then pushes the locker back into the wall where it disappears.]
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Ah. That's what the weapons locker opened to. If it ever came down to it, he could always cut Kage's hand off -
Oh, for the love of MAR.]
Kage. Sleep it off.
[There's a low, warm note of warning in Erol's voice. System or not, it went against every fiber of his being to see a good man wasted in self-pity. Haven didn't have the manpower to waste on nonsense like suicide. If you're going to deliberately kill yourself, at least have the decency to entertain others while you're at it - in racing - or take out a few 'Heads or Underground scum.
Haven didn't have the manpower to waste - neither did the boat. No, Erol didn't care, but it screamed against his instincts. His weight rocks forwards; he's had significantly less alcohol than Kage, he'll take him down if he has to.]
{Continued here.}
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