The Last Voyages: IC Inbox

[worthallthis]

There is no voice message here. Better hope you got the right box.

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[worthallthis]

He actually snorts. "If I'd left bruises like that on a handler. I'd have had cattle prods and guns and a double session of maintenance," he grumbles. A little time behind bars was nothing. This prison is so stupid, sometimes.

[shadowsran]

"We don't do that here," she's quick to say. Maintenance the way she can only imagine he means it - not how it's done. Inhumane. "Isn't like he came close to killing me. I think I broke his nose, he got a good long cooldown period, for here we have to hope that's reasonable."

[worthallthis]

The moment of annoyance drains out again, and he shovels the last of the oatmeal away slowly. "I know," he finally says. "Three months without maintenance." There, that's-- that's three wardens now who know. And one of them is his. If it's going to happen, it'll happen now. Right?

[shadowsran]

She nods at that. Frowns.

"There's won't be any. Nothing like it, not at al while you're here. Anyone tries anything either they'll get demoted or somebody'll hear about it and remove that problem for you. Alright?"

[worthallthis]

His shoulders hunch a little more, but he nods. "Okay." He has a breath, then says again, more quietly, "Okay." No more maintenance.

It's what he wanted. Why does hearing it, out loud, from his own current warden, make him want to throw the empty oatmeal bowl across the room.

He manages not to, breathing carefully, holding his spoon very tightly. But the urge is there. Holding it back is like holding a lid down on a boiling pot. It makes his eyes sting and his vision blur a little, throat tight. From the outside, it looks like he's about to cry. (Spoiler: he is, actually, he just doesn't recognize the symptoms.)

[shadowsran]

It isn't unnoticed, or ignored. It could be a flash of something, she reasons, and so permits him a moment to gather or excuse himself if he intends to. When that doesn't happen, she leans forward slightly.

"If you want to walk something off," she starts, a murmur to hopefully curb eavesdroppers, "It's fine. I can take care of your stuff, or-- let you into the Enclosure now, whatever you need."

[worthallthis]

His face is... wet. Christ, he's crying. He remembers this, but more in the context of too much pain than too much feeling. It makes his breath do stupid things, and he has to sniff and wipe at his face with the back of his flesh hand before he can manage to say anything. "I. Have to go to work."

[shadowsran]

"Arthur'll understand if I kept you busy a couple extra minutes, I can give him the heads up." Still suggestion, but more earnest than many previous. It's a poor thing to rush for, reasonable as Arthur is. "Could take a lap, catch your breath, wash your face-?"

[worthallthis]

Yeah he probably ought to at least do that last one. He sniffs again, then gets his breathing under control, even if there are still a few tears trying to leak their way out. Catching his breath, done. "Okay. Sorry. I'm okay." Going to to hit things in the Enclosure is so tempting, but it seems like it might take too long.

[shadowsran]

As he dies that, she collects his plate, moving it to where dining staff can retrieve it. "Walk? Enclosure?"

Implication being she'll accompany him as long as is needed or wanted.

[worthallthis]

He hesitates, giving his face another wipe, this time with a napkin before putting that in the trash, too. But temptation is too much. "Enclosure. I. Something to hit." He managed not to throw his bowl. This is progress. But the urge is still there. The crying hasn't made it go away.

[shadowsran]

"Okay."

Easy, done. Nothing left to attend, she starts them off at a focused clip.

"Something like a gym, or something that'll break?"

[worthallthis]

He stalks in her wake, head down and hands gripped tightly behind his back. His voice is tight but steady. "I don't know. Cracks in walls are. Satisfying. So was the bag in Zhao Yunlan's room. Never actually broken a thing before."

[shadowsran]

"Partial to breaking, myself."

Not hard to hit both beats, of course. The Enclosure quickly reached, she spends only a few moments fussing with the keypad before getting roughly what she's looking for - a store, sporting-goods adjacent, with one manually added bag in a corner. Shelves to be tipped, displays to be smashes, equipment to be thrown or bent any which way. Healthy variety. Parking herself behind the register, the whole of it is indicated with a lazy wave of her arm. "Have at it."

[worthallthis]

He looks a little stunned by the sheer array of things. He almost doesn't know where to start, and for a moment he's frozen in place. Then the sheer stupidity of being stymied by choice of things to fucking hit breaks the stasis, and he just heaves the nearest shelf right over with a whine from the metal arm.

It makes a very satisfying crash.

What follows is half an hour of lots of knocking shelves down, some picking up larger things that fall off the shelves and twisting them into unrecognizable shapes, and some punching at the anchored heavy bag in the back of the room. He only comes up short at the rack of paintball masks on a back wall, and he winds up staring hard at them for a long few minutes before whirling away and going back to the punching bag. They're the only things in the room he doesn't touch.

By the end of the half hour he's exhausted and the metal arm is a little overheated, but he does, in fact, feel better.

[shadowsran]

Patiently waiting all the while, Misty watches. There are displays around her at the register, a lot of glass she vividly imagines taking a golf club to, but it's his avenue to vent. She won't ask him to share it, or risk distracting him. Startling him.

It's all plenty impressive, the masks an interesting thing to file away. When he halts he's given a minute or two to catch his breath before she inches over, hands clasped.

"Want, like, water?"

[worthallthis]

Now he's just kind of leaning on the bag, braced with a hand on the chain holding it, eyes shut while the metal arm makes some unhappy-sounding hisses and buzzes as it tries to cool itself down. For a beat he tenses at the question--

"Want a drink?" his handler asks, but he knows he's not supposed to answer that. He says nothing. He waits for his orders while his handler drinks in front of him.

--but this isn't DC. This is the Barge. Misty isn't Pierce, and he's supposed to answer, now. "Sure," he says tiredly.

[shadowsran]

An index finger raised; an unspoken just-one-minute before she turns on her heel and darts off. A minute or three pass before she's back, an unopened bottle in her outstretched hand.

"Is all the whirring normal, or did you overtax it?" She asks, referring to the metal arm.

[worthallthis]

"It's overheated," he admits, and somewhat tentatively takes the water bottle using the flesh hand-- not touching Misty's hand at all, carefully touching the cap only-- so the metal one can continue to make unhappy noises as it ratchets down to a more functional level. Not even his fight with Rogers had lasted this long. "Needs to cool down. Will have to adjust some gears inside later."

[shadowsran]

"Normal wear and tear as opposed to broken, I'm hoping." She would feel bad if she'd inadvertently contributed to breaking something she would guess is fairly complicated. Someone who can't manage libraries would likely have a difficult time getting it checked in Tech.

"These aren't hard to pull up, you ever need one again."

[worthallthis]

"Nothing feels broken." He doubts anything as simple as destruction of a store would actually break anything, anyway. That would require something massive, like being landed on by something heavy or actively based into with something unbreakable. "And you might regret that. I want to hit things. A lot."

Somebody really ought to just invest in a heavy punching bag in his cabin, or something.

[shadowsran]

It's not anything she'd dare claim familiarity with - parts could wear out, pop out of place, catch on something, and it wouldn't be in her wheelhouse enough to spot. Better to ask, better to be safe. Her head shakes, just the once.

"Wouldn't be a bother, it's not like much I get up to here's time-sensitive. If it helps clear your head, no reason you shouldn't get to it. The gym not really your speed?"

[worthallthis]

He doesn't shrug, because that would probably hurt, but there's kind of the air of an awkward shrug to him. "Too many people. Too likely for people to walk in if there aren't. Feels. Like being watched. Always was watched, before." And now the feeling of it makes him feel some awkward mix of relaxed and uncomfortable, like it's how it should be but how it should be sucks.

[shadowsran]

"Could ask for one in here, if you can catch it empty?"

Tricky, but exertion clearly seems to do some level of good. No reason it shouldn't be pursued.

"Or the pool's usually easy to catch empty, if it's just any exercise that'll help you. Or some system for your room, jogging..."

[worthallthis]

"Need a warden to get into here." And it's pretty popular, from the sound of things. A pool... he finds has absolutely no associations with pools. No idea what it'd be like. He has some of the water, finally, and admits, "Cabin's a thing. Starting to look kind of stressed, though. Lots of cracks in the walls. And I worry about hurting Vesta."

Pause. She doesn't know the name yet. "That's the cat. Godric helped me name her."